Transcript of Gates’ speech at CEO Summit 5/23

Microsoft.com: “Well, intellectual property is the backbone of our economy. There are a lot of issues about it. There are the piracy issues. Worldwide, you have that with music,
you have it with drug knockoffs, so there are a lot of issues now about should people pay for intellectual property.

I think if we took a poll in this room, intellectual property would do quite well. (Laughter.) And you need to spread the word about that. But it does have some
interesting challenges. Let me look at SAP, which is a wonderful company, but if we just zoom in on this, you can see a lot of fluctuation here. What’s this
about? Well, intellectual property has an interesting problem, which is that it lasts forever. And so it’s not like Coca Cola where you say, “Okay, you liked your
last Coke; now would you like another one,” or razor blades that wear out. If people buy ERP systems, there’s actually a serious question what the additional
revenue will be.”