“The UAE has used technology for economic development,” he told the top government decision-makers from GCC states and the Middle East at the two-day Government Leadership Forum, being organised by Microsoft.

Bill Gates spoke at length on the rapidly changing technological scene in the information technology (IT) sector, saying the magic of software would help drive economic growth and spread its benefits.

Technology had touched millions of lives and played a significant role in fostering economic development across the region. “Microsoft’s goal is to work in close partnership with governments and partner organisations to help them use technology to accelerate social and economic development,” he added.

On the technological developments, Gates hinted that the next digital decade would be interactive, where innovations in information technology, telecommunication and their innovative applications would revolutionise the world.

The mobile phone, he said, would be software-centric, and computer chips would continue to play their pivotal role in the next digital transformation, as many new innovative services would be added by using them.

The computer chip, which played a key role in the IT revolution, would keep getting better, smaller and less expensive to further the benefits IT had brought.

He said his idea of a new kind of “creative capitalism” was aimed at improving the lives of the world’s poorest people.

Gates said large food, technology and other companies had to work with the governments to find ways to solve the problems of the poor people without sacrificing their own business needs.

In the next four years, the IT sector in the region, comprising Egypt, Jordan, Kuwait, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and the UAE, would generate more than 210,000 new jobs and account for the creation of more than 4,100 new IT companies, according to a new study by IDC.