Microsoft's Bill Gates says China to remain largest broadband market

BEIJING (XFN-ASIA) - China is set to remain the world's largest broadband market after recently overtaking the US, Bill Gates, chairman and co-founder of Microsoft Corp, said at an innovation forum here.

'China has surpassed the US in the number of broadband users. And once this is the largest market, it will stay the largest market. There's an advantage to having 1.3 bln people,' Gates said.

He noted that price constraints for fast, reliable Internet access were falling by the wayside.

'The price of broadband has been a limiting factor, but competition is bringing the price down,' he said.

China, currently a global leader in hardware, would soon become a leader in software, he added.

'Innovation here is really growing at a rapid pace. I give a lot of credit here to the universities. China will be a leader ... it's already true for hardware, but it will also be true for software,' Gates said.

He added that Microsoft (nasdaq: MSFT - news - people ) had China's affection for mobile communications in mind when it recently signed a joint research deal with China's leading computer maker Lenovo.

'We are focusing with Lenovo on mobility,' Gates said.

Lenovo, the world's No.3 computer company, announced on Wednesday that it plans to set up a 50-50 multi-million-dollar joint research and development center in Beijing with Microsoft.

The partners will try to identify opportunities in the consumer and mobile markets such as digital photography, digital media and the Internet, Craig Mundie, chief research and strategy officer at Microsoft, was reported as saying.