Sunday November 14, 11:00 pm Eastern Time
Microsoft's Gates shows new devices for Web
LAS VEGAS, Nov 14 (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp. (NasdaqNM:MSFT - news) Chairman and Chief Executive Bill Gates showed off his company's new scaled-down Internet appliance to a standing-room crowd at the Comdex computer trade show, where the personal computer is no longer the star.
Gates, in his kick-off keynote address at Comdex, showed a small appliance called the MSN-based Web Companion, which Microsoft has designed, as he discussed how the Internet will become more personal.
The Web Companion is a small textbook-sized device that runs Microsoft's Windows CE software, and connects to the Internet, using Microsoft's MSN Internet service.
Microsoft's new device, and others like it, will be part of a future in which homes have multiple devices accessing the Internet from every room, Gates predicted. These devices will range from PCs to Internet appliances to wireless handheld devices and cellular phones.
The MSN-based Web Companion is expected to be available sometime in the second half of 2000. Companies such as Acer Inc. , Philips Electronics Inc. , Thomson Consumer Electronics and Vestal USA, a unit of the Turkish consumer electronics company Vestel , will be developing them for use with the MSN service.
The devices are expected to range in cost from free to around $200. Bundling deals will be offered similar to those offered by other computer makers and online service providers, where the user gets a system or an Internet appliance at very low cost in exchange for signing up for three years of Internet service.
In his speech, Gates also talked about how the Internet will move from a static model to a more interactive one, where users can access favorite Web sites to get exactly the information they need, on a wide range of devices.
Gates's keynote address at Comdex was his first major public appearance since his company was found to be a predatory monopolist in a preliminary ruling by U.S. Judge Thomas Penfield Jackson in a landmark antitrust case nine days ago.
A standing-room-only crowd gathered in a ballroom at the Venetian Hotel in Las Vegas to hear the world's richest man discuss his vision of the industry's future.
Gates's keynote address on Sunday night has been a tradition in recent years at Comdex, the industry's biggest U.S. trade show, where over 200,000 attendees are expected to visit over one million square footage of showroom floor space.
Gates also gave a demonstration of Windows 2000, Microsoft's long-delayed upgrade of its Windows NT operating system for corporate and network computers. He showed a Web site running on five different servers all running Window 2000, in an effort to show the stability of Windows 2000.
Windows 2000 has been in development for many years and was once expected to be shipped at the end of 1997 as an update to Windows NT version 4.0, which was released in July 1996. It is now expected to go on sale Feb. 17. |
