Zain Nadella, son of Microsoft's CEO Satya Nadella and his wife Anu, passed away on Monday morning. He was 26 years old and had been had been born with cerebral palsy.

Microsoft told its executive staff in an email about Zain’s death and asked them to hold the family in their thoughts and prayers while giving them space to grieve privately for the loss.

In October 2017, Satya Nadella spoke about Zain Nadella's birth with cerebral palsy in a blog post. "One night, during the thirty-sixth week of her pregnancy, Anu noticed that the baby was not moving as much as she was accustomed to. So we went to the emergency room of a local hospital in Bellevue," Nadella wrote.

"Zain was transported from the hospital in Bellevue across Lake Washington to Seattle Children’s Hospital with its state-of-the-art Neonatal Intensive Care Unit," Nadella said. Zain was born on August 13, 1996.

‘Helped understand the journey of people with disabilities’

He added, "Becoming a father of a son with special needs was the turning point in my life that has shaped who I am today. It has helped me better understand the journey of people with disabilities. It has shaped my personal passion for and philosophy of connecting new ideas to empathy for others."

Taking over as the CEO of Microsoft in 2014, Nadella directed the company on designing products to better serve users with disabilities and often cited the lessons he learned from raising and supporting Zain.

Last year, the Children's Hospital — where Zain received much of his treatment — established the Zain Nadella Endowed Chair in Pediatric Neurosciences, as part of Seattle Children’s Center, for Integrative brain research.

Jeff Sperring, CEO of the hospital said, "Zain will be remembered for his eclectic taste in music, his bright sunny smile and the immense joy he brought to his family and all those who loved him."

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