Advertisment

Gates to visit India to explain Internet strategy

author-image
CIOL Bureau
Updated On
New Update

NEW DELHI: Software giant Microsoft Corp chairman Bill Gates will address

policymakers, state leaders and a host of software developers next week during a

fleeting visit to India to explain his Internet strategy.

Advertisment

Microsoft India managing director Sanjay Mirchandani said the .Net strategy

was as crucial to Microsoft as its switch a decade ago from the plain text based

DOS operating system to the colorful, ubiquitous Windows.

".Net (strategy) is as important as the shift was from DOS to

Windows," he told a news conference.

Gates' one-day visit to New Delhi on September 14 comes three years after his

first visit to the country.

Advertisment

That was followed the next year by the establishment of Microsoft's first

full-scale software development center outside its Seattle home base, in the

southern Indian city of Hyderabad.

Gates, who is now chief software architect after quitting as chief executive

officer, will also hold a news conference in Delhi.

While he will address policy-makers to promote his company's initiatives for

e-governance, or the use of Internet in policymaking, his business with software

developers will be more technical.

Advertisment

India, with its thousands of programmers, is considered crucial for Microsoft

to develop end-use software based on the core technologies that the company

specializes in.

Company officials say India has produced more than 100,000 professionals

certified in applying Microsoft's technologies.

Microsoft officials said the new strategy would center on "software as a

service", an emerging trend in which users would pay for software they

would rent, the XML language which would enable efficient access and display of

data, and emerging smart devices like mobile Internet tools.

Although many of the so-called open standards and technologies driving

Internet are not owned by any one company, Microsoft officials expect to offer a

range of tools and components which would make things easier for developers.

(C) Reuters Limited 2000.

tech-news