Microsoft CEO Bill Gates, 43, is the founder of the computer industry’s most powerful and successful company and is now building what could become one of the world’s elite corporate laboratories. At his third annual CEO summit last May, Gates told CEOs they’d be more productive the further they go up the digital ladder and told them Microsoft will go to a full wireless connectivity network infrastructure within a year or so. At the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in April, he told students and faculty that within five years, most jobs will use the Internet more than telephones. Gates’ new book, Business @ the Speed of Thought, is a roadmap for businesses entering the digital age. Published in March, the book is the No.1 Money book on the USA TODAY bestseller list.

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I was in high school when I first read about the microprocessor, in an article my friend Paul Allen found in Electronics magazine. Paul and I already wrote software, but that article got us thinking that we might be able to make money doing it. Back then, there weren't really any pure software companies. Computer makers like IBM and Digital wrote their own proprietary software for their own machines. They certainly didn't want Paul or me writing it for them.

Intel's microprocessor changed all that. First, Intel didn't make computers or software -- yet to do anything useful, its new chip needed software. So Paul and I saw a chance to start a software company. Second, it was clear that the microprocessor would dramatically change the computer industry, by cutting manufacturing costs and adding new features.

Intel's advertisement for its new chip, "Announcing a new era of integrated electronics," proved very farsighted.

When Intel's Ted Hoff (with Federico Faggin and Stan Mazor) invented the microprocessor, he didn't intend to change the world. Asked by one of Intel's customers to produce a dozen custom chips for a range of calculators, Hoff thought it would be easier to manufacture a general-purpose chip that would rely on software to make it perform different tasks. The result was the Intel 4004 microprocessor. Built on a sliver of silicon, it contained 2,300 tiny transistors and was effectively a computer on a single chip. Introduced in 1971, it launched an entire industry.

Not quite a PC

It also changed my life, with the help of what claimed to be the "World's First Minicomputer Kit" -- the MITS Altair 8800. Named after a world in the movie Forbidden Planet, the 1975 Altair used an Intel 8080 microprocessor and cost under $400. But it couldn't do anything useful. It had no keyboard or screen -- and no software. So Paul and I formed a partnership we called Micro-Soft, and wrote some software that would make the Altair perform simple tasks. Six years later, when IBM launched the first modern PC, we supplied operating system software for that, too.

Powered by the microprocessor, the PC has changed the world. It has revolutionized how we collect, store and use information, how we communicate with each other, how we work, learn and play. Just 20 years ago, nobody used a computer unless they were a hobbyist or worked in a corporate computer department. Today's PCs, using sophisticated software and microprocessors containing more than nine million transistors, give even a child access to more computing power than an old mainframe computer.

It's remarkable how we now take all that power for granted. Using a basic home PC costing less than $1,000, you can balance your household budget, do your taxes, write letters to friends and fax or e-mail them over the Internet, listen to CDs or the radio, watch the news, consult a doctor, play games, book a vacation, view a house, buy a book or a car... the list is endless.

The ubiquitous chip

These days microprocessors are found in all kinds of products -- from cell phones to CD players to your new Cadillac Seville, which has more than 60 -- but it's their use in the PC that has had the biggest global impact.

We've seen huge gains in productivity as a result of the PC, and enormous strides in education, medicine, recreation and commerce. And thanks to the PC, people in remote areas can now telecommute to work.

A combination of the PC and the Internet is making news and information travel faster and more freely than ever before, helping to open up closed economies and bring democracy to repressive nations -- you can't build borders in cyberspace. The microprocessor-powered PC has given people more freedom, and the power to do more with their freedom. It's hardly surprising that about $30 billion of microprocessors will be sold this year -- or that, by next year, the world will probably buy more PCs than TVs.

Hold on to your hats

But the really amazing thing is that we're still only at the dawn of the digital age. In the past two decades, the power of microprocessors has increased more than one million times. But 20 years from now, microprocessors will probably be more than a million times again as powerful as they are today. And they'll contain up to one billion transistors.

Over the next few years the PC will remain the main computing tool for most people, but it will be joined by all kinds of new, microprocessor-powered devices that will make your life even easier. For example, when you're traveling you'll be able to call up your itinerary, send an e-mail postcard, book an appointment with your doctor or balance your bank account using a handheld PC that will know what information you need, and when and where you need it. And you'll be able to get a map, hotel guide or the news from the Web via new kinds of cell phones.

A really smart house

At home, you'll be able to operate your PC by talking to it. It will automatically back up all your information, update its own software and synchronize itself with your TV, cell phone, handheld, and all the devices on your home network. The refrigerator in your kitchen will know how well stocked it is, suggest recipes based on what's available, and order more food from your online grocer. Your TV will double as an interactive shopping mall, letting you buy advertised products or clothes you saw in a sitcom. And if you don't want to watch TV, you'll be able to read an electronic book that knows your favorite authors and automatically downloads their latest novels. If you decide to read one of them, your bank account will be debited.

Sounds like science fiction? Just a few years ago, it was. But thanks to the microprocessor -- and to all the incredible innovations in software, hardware, the Internet and telecommunications -- everything I've described is already possible. And although you can't yet buy all these devices at your local computer retailer, the incredible speed at which technology is advancing means that it won't be long before they're as commonplace as the PC.

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