About Patrick Joseph McGovern
Patrick Joseph McGovern Jr. (August 11, 1937 – March 19, 2014) was an American businessman, and chairman and founder of International Data Group (IDG), a company with subsidiaries in technology publishing, research, event management and venture capital. In September 2013, he was listed on the Forbes 400 list of the wealthiest Americans, with a net worth of $5.1 billion. == Biography == Forbes magazine wrote that in the 1950s, McGovern earned a college scholarship by designing an unbeatable tic-tac-toe program. During his sophomore year, he worked at the MIT student newspaper The Tech on the features staff. McGovern received a degree in course 7, or biology/life sciences, from MIT, in 1959. After graduating, his first job was writing for a pioneering computer magazine, Edmund C. Berkeley's Computers and Automation. In 1964, McGovern founded International Data Corporation (IDC), which produced a computer-industry database and published the newsletter EDP Industry & Market Report (based on "ADP Newsletter", published by The Diebold Group). After three years, the company was losing money, and McGovern contemplated liquidating it. In 1967, he hit on the idea of making the newsletter into a weekly newspaper, Computerworld.
Biography source: Wikipedia. The profile adds birthday-specific historical context from the Celebs Birthday Today editorial database.