Yana Paskova/Getty Images Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates.
- Microsoft cofounder and philanthropist Bill Gates thinks big tech companies shouldn't be broken up. Instead, the government should play a role in regulating them.
- In an interview with Bloomberg's Erik Schatzker, Gates discussed the responsibilities of tech companies amid a slew of antitrust probes into Amazon, Facebook, Google, and Apple.
- Gates went through his own antitrust lawsuit when Microsoft lost against the Department of Justice in 1998 and was almost forced to break up into smaller entities as a result.
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Bill Gates thinks big tech companies shouldn't be broken up, but the government should regulate them.
In an interview with Bloomberg's Erik Schatzker, Gates discussed global inequality, climate change, and the responsibilities of big tech companies. Schatzker brought up the tech industry amid a slew of antitrust probes into Amazon, Facebook, Google, and Apple.
Gates went through his own antitrust lawsuit when the company he co-founded, Microsoft, was sued by the Department of Justice and a coalition of 20 state attorneys general in 1998. Since losing the case, Gates's opinion on government regulation has evolved.
Here are his thoughts.
