Gates held talks with Dubai’s ruler, Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashed al-Maktoum, and signed a deal with the charitable foundation that carries the ruler’s name to launch the Arab Education and Research Network portal.
The initiative aims to "serve as a gateway to world-class knowledge," and includes the creation of a database of digital Arabic research to provide a backbone for the foundation’s work, Microsoft said.
Microsoft will support the foundation by designing and implementing a "state-of-the-art technology platform that enables collaborative research and knowledge creation in the Arab world," it said.
Sheikh Mohammed announced the launch of the foundation during the Middle East World Economic Forum held last year in Jordan with a 10-billion-dollar (6.8 billion-euro) budget.
