Bill Gates left the Microsoft board in 2020 as the board pursued an investigation into the billionaire’s romantic relationship with a female employee, The Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday (Monday in Manila). This was “an affair almost 20 years ago, which ended amicably,” a spokesman for Gates told the Journal. According to the spokesman, Gates left Microsoft to focus more on his philanthropic organization, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. A spokesman for Microsoft said the company was alerted in the second half of 2019 that “Bill Gates sought to initiate an intimate relationship with a company employee in the year 2000. Gates’ team assured the board the Microsoft founder had met Epstein for “philanthropic reasons” and “regretted doing so,” the Journal said.

Source: Manila Times May 17, 2021 16:18 UTC