Years before Microsoft’s board investigated a romantic relationship that founder Bill Gates had with an employee, Gates was told by fellow executives to stop inappropriately emailing with a different employee, Microsoft (MSFT) confirmed on Monday.
In 2008, when Gates was still a Microsoft (MSFT) employee and chairman of the board, executives discovered emails sent a year earlier between him and a mid-level female employee in which he asked her to meet outside of work, according to a report from the Wall Street Journal Monday citing people familiar with the matter. At the time, then-general counsel Brad Smith and then-chief people officer Lisa Brummel met with Gates to tell him the behavior was inappropriate and should stop, and Gates agreed, the Journal reported.
Microsoft confirmed the Journal’s report to CNN Business but declined to comment. Microsoft spokesperson Frank Shaw told the Journal that “while flirtatious, [the emails] were not overtly sexual, but were deemed to be inappropriate,” and that the employee never made a complaint about the incident.
A spokeswoman for Gates, Bridgitt Arnold, denied the claims in a written statement to the Journal. “These claims are false, recycled rumors from sources who have no direct knowledge, and in some cases have significant conflicts of interest,” she said. Representatives for Gates’ did not respond to multiple requests for comment from CNN Business.
Source: CNN
