31 Facts About Gabe Newell

Gabe Newell is the president and co-founder of the video game company Valve Corporation.

Gabe Newell attended Harvard University in the early 1980s but dropped out to join Microsoft, where he helped create the first versions of the Windows operating system.

Harrington sold his stake in Valve to Gabe Newell and left in 2000.

Gabe Newell led the development of Valve's digital distribution service, Steam, which launched in 2003 and controlled most of the market for downloaded PC games by 2011.

Gabe Newell has been estimated as one of the wealthiest people in the United States and the wealthiest person in the video games industry, with a net worth of as of 2024.

Gabe Newell is the owner of the marine research organization Inkfish and the neuroscience company Starfish Neuroscience.

Gabe Newell was born on November 3,1962, in Colorado, and attended Davis Senior High School in Davis, California.

Gabe Newell worked as a paperboy, and later a telegram messenger for Western Union.

Gabe Newell enrolled at Harvard University in 1980, but was convinced to drop out to work at Microsoft by the head of sales in 1983.

Gabe Newell spent 13 years at Microsoft as a programmer and technical executive, and produced the first three releases of the operating system Windows.

Gabe Newell later said he learned more during his first three months at Microsoft than he ever did at Harvard, which was one of the primary reasons why he dropped out.

Gabe Newell opted to found Valve instead of retiring as he felt working with "other really smart, motivated, socially orientated people to create product that would affect millions of other people" was "the most fun I could have".

Gabe Newell and Harrington funded development of the first Valve game, the first-person shooter Half-Life, which was a critical and commercial success.

Gabe Newell gave Valve no deadline and a "virtually unlimited" budget to develop Half-Life 2, promising to fund it himself if necessary.

At a technology conference in Seattle that year, Gabe Newell argued that software piracy was best addressed by offering a superior option rather than pursuing anti-piracy technology.

Gabe Newell cited Steam's success in Russia, where piracy is rife, as an example.

In 2007, Gabe Newell expressed his displeasure over developing for game consoles, saying that developing processes for Sony's PlayStation 3 was a "waste of everybody's time".

Gabe Newell criticized the Xbox Live service, referring to it as a "train wreck", and Windows 8, calling it a threat to the open nature of PC gaming.

At the 2013 LinuxCon, Gabe Newell said the Linux operating system and open source development were "the future of gaming".

Gabe Newell accused the proprietary systems of companies such as Microsoft and Apple of stifling innovation through slow certification processes.

In 2022, with Philip Sabes, Gabe Newell co-founded the neuroscience company Starfish Neuroscience to develop neural interfaces.

Gabe Newell is the owner of the marine research organization Inkfish, which owns several ships and submarines.

In December 2021, Forbes estimated that Gabe Newell had a net worth of and owned at least one quarter of Valve.

Gabe Newell formerly suffered from Fuchs' dystrophy, a congenital disease which affects the cornea.

Gabe Newell was cured via two cornea transplants in 2006 and 2007.

In 2011, Gabe Newell said his favorite video games included Super Mario 64, Doom, and a Burroughs mainframe version of the 1971 Star Trek game, which was the first game he ever played.

Gabe Newell was a fan of the animated series My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic.

Gabe Newell recorded a voice pack for the Valve game Dota 2, which referenced many previous statements and phrases from himself in a humorous manner.

Gabe Newell was visiting New Zealand with friends when the COVID-19 pandemic emerged, and elected to stay in Auckland once travel restrictions were eased.

Gabe Newell applied for permanent residency in New Zealand in October 2020, but had returned to Seattle by 2021.

Gabe Newell owns several ships, and has lived mostly at sea since the pandemic.