How MS Excel revolutionised data analysis and brought us the magic of PC spreadsheets

Microsoft Excel's first version was launched in 1985 for - irony alert! - Apple's Mac. There are probably 400 mn paid users of MS Excel today around the world. But it wasn't Excel that started the spreadsheet revolution. The credit goes to VisiCalc, the first spreadsheet program for PCs, released in 1979 for Apple II. Launched a few years later, Lotus 1-2-3 became even more popular in the 1980s - until Microsoft came with Excel.