Gates speaks out on court's decision

The world's richest man breathed a very public sigh of relief last night following the appeal court's decision to throw out many of the distric court's rulings.

This is a transcript of his speech:

"We're still reviewing the details of the ruling from the Court of Appeals, but it's clear that it reverses and significantly narrows the District Court's decision. The ruling lifts the cloud of breakup over the company, reverses the tying claim, and says clearly that we did not attempt to monopolise the browser market.

"The central issue in this case was the fundamental principle that every company must have the ability to innovate and improve its products. We're very pleased that this ruling reverses the lower court ruling and sets a much higher standard for these issues than the lower court applied. It sets a high bar for any ruling against the inclusion of new features in our products.

"The legal process can be hard on anyone who goes through it, and the last four years have been challenging for all of us here at Microsoft - and for me personally. But despite the many twists and turns of the case, I've always had faith in our company, in our employees, and in the magic of the software we are creating.

"Throughout the past 25 years, we've built our business on the vision of making the PC and its benefits available to everyone, everywhere. We've also created opportunity for lots of other companies. Literally thousands of hardware and software companies work with Microsoft, using our tools and services to build their businesses. These past few years we've done even more to partner and communicate with companies throughout the industry.

"We recognise that as a successful company, we have an important responsibility to the broader industry. We take that responsibility very seriously, and we will continue to work hard to provide great opportunity for our industry partners and consumers.

"In fact, I believe we've done some of our best work during this time. We built Windows 2000, the most reliable PC operating system ever. We launched our .NET strategy, making possible a new world of Web services. We recently released Office XP, the next generation of office software. And soon we'll unveil Windows XP, Xbox and the Tablet PC - all products that bring the best of the digital world to home and work. Today's decision is consistent with our ability to go forward with these crucial and innovative products.

"Today's decision overturned much of the District Court's ruling, but not all of it - and naturally we'll be reviewing the ruling in the days ahead and determining what actions we now need to take in response to these issues. Most of the licensing provisions cited by the court were discontinued years ago. However, we'll be making a review of our licensing provisions in light of today's decision. We will also continue to work hard to resolve the remaining issues without continued need for litigation.

"I'm incredibly optimistic about the future. I believe that breakthrough software technologies will continue to improve how we do business, communicate, and work with information. Software will enable computers to see, listen and learn, taking PC technology to new levels of intelligence and ease of use. These advances are only possible because companies have the freedom to keep innovating.
I want to close by thanking the thousands of people who have expressed support for Microsoft through their letters, calls and emails. That support has meant a great deal to us here.

"I also want to thank the employees here at Microsoft for their belief in the company, and for the amazing job that they have done in difficult circumstances. While the past four years have been tough, Microsoft's employees stayed focused on finding the next breakthroughs and building great products.

"Thank you."