Microsoft
“Paul is feeling OK and remains upbeat,” his sister Jody Allen said yesterday in an e-mail to employees of Vulcan Inc., his investment group. He was diagnosed earlier this month and has diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, which she said is a relatively common form of the disease.
Allen, 56, successfully fought off Hodgkins lymphoma more than 25 years ago, an illness that caused him to leave Microsoft, the worlds largest software maker. While he plans to continue working, his “health comes first,” said Jody Allen, who is Vulcans chief executive officer.
Allen, who ranked No. 2 on Forbes magazines list of the richest Americans in 1999, with a $40 billion fortune, fell to No. 12 last year, with $16 billion. Allen has reduced his holdings of Microsoft shares since he left the company.
The son of a librarian, Allen founded Microsoft in 1975 with Bill Gates, a classmate at the private Lakeside School in Seattle. Since leaving Microsoft, he has invested in technology companies, including creating St. Louis-based cable-TV provider Charter Communications Inc., which filed for bankruptcy protection in March.
Non-Hodgkins Lymphoma
Non-Hodgkins lymphoma is a group of cancers that trigger white blood cells to grow uncontrollably and cause masses to form in the lymph nodes. Allens cancer, diffuse large B-cell lymphoma, accounts for as much as 30 percent of newly diagnosed cases and is an aggressive, or fast-growing, lymphoma, according to the Lymphoma Research Foundation. It can arise in lymph nodes or outside the lymphatic system, in the gastrointestinal tract, testes, thyroid, skin, breast, bone or brain, the foundation said.
Almost 66,000 new cases of non-Hodgkins lymphoma will be diagnosed in the U.S. this year, and 19,500 people will die from the disease, according to the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Maryland. Prognosis and treatment depend upon the stage and type of the disease.
“Melinda and I have Paul and his family in our thoughts and prayers,” Gates, chairman of Redmond, Washington-based Microsoft, said in a statement. “Paul is among my closest friends and I know him to be a strong and resilient individual.”
Seattle Seahawks
Among Allens holdings are the Seattle Seahawks football team and the Portland Trailblazers basketball team. He also backed a Seattle music and science-fiction museum housed in a multicolored Frank Gehry-designed building, and he anchored the redevelopment of Seattles South Lake Union neighborhood.
Seattle-based Vulcan has invested in cancer-drug developers including BiPar Sciences Inc. and Seattle Genetics Inc. The company also owned 30 percent of Metricom Inc., a San Jose, California-based wireless Internet service company, when it filed for bankruptcy in 2001. The remains of Digeo Inc., a closely held maker of digital-video recorders backed by Allen, filed for bankruptcy protection this month.
Allens foundation has donated to the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center in Seattle.
“This is tough news for Paul and the family,” Jody Allen said in her e-mail. “But for those who know Pauls story, you know he beat Hodgkins a little more than 25 years ago and he is optimistic he can beat this, too.”