Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates said today the Internet's role as an important mass medium for advertisers was hobbled by the slow rollout of the high-speed broadband services that were still years away.
Mr Gates, speaking at a Microsoft-sponsored conference on the future of digital marketing, said the slow adoption of broadband access into homes has depressed consumers' use of the Internet.
"If it's there and on all the time," Mr Gates said of Internet access, "you would use it quite extensively". He said it should become a priority for political and corporate leaders to make broadband-access products more available to home users.
Microsoft has stepped up its commitment to the Internet media sector over the past two years, investing heavily in its Web portal and Internet service provider, MSN.
The company has committed $100 million in fiscal 2001 to promote MSN to advertisers in the hopes of generating more advertising revenue. But this campaign, dubbed "MSN Advantage Marketing" kicked off amid a steep slump in advertising across all media.
Mr Gates declined to offer guidance on when the MSN business unit would break even. He said its profitability hinges upon a combination of selling advertising and charging users for a variety of MSN services.
Microsoft has been focusing on the US broadband and cable television market recently in a bid to prevent arch-rival AOL Time Warner becoming the dominant player there.