Sources at Microsoft have confirmed today that a new and improved version of the company's founder, Bill Gates, is to be released by the end of August 2006.

Gates v2.0 is said to have been in development for over four years, and Microsoft are promising a "bolder and more dynamic" version of the Seattle born billionaire, which it hopes will address many of the glitches and bugs that plagued the original version.

Despite the many and often obvious flaws which affected the Gates v1.0 model, he still played a crucal role in steering his fledgling software company to become one of the largest and most successful corporations in the world, with an annual turnover of over ten billion US dollars.

News of the upgraded Gates first broke last week, when an internal Microsoft memo was leaked onto the internet, giving some details of what could be expected from this latest release. 

According to the leaked document, Gates v2.0 will address many of the character flaws of v1.0, and will boast "an improved humor interface, increased empathy with fellow humans" and an astonishing "one thousand times more charisma" than it's predecessor.


The Second Edition Gates is also rumoured to speak over forty languages, and will have a firm grasp of fair play and tolerance - features which Microsoft elected to leave out of the original edition, and which they subsequently came under heavy fire for.

In an address to the media this morning, Microsoft spokesman, Mark Martin, confirmed the rumours, though stressed that support for Gates v1.0 will be continuing until the fourth quarter of 2007, whereupon he will be deactivated and recycled.

Along with the personality upgrades, Martin announced that the new edition Gates will be "physically stronger and more attractive to the opposite sex".  It is believed Gates' wife, Melinda, played a key role in developing the visual design of her husband's version update.

The new edition is not Microsoft's first attempt to improve the functionality and performance of its founder.  In 2003 a v1.1.5 patch designed to address some of his biggest problems was released, with mixed results. 

Although the patch succeeded in increasing Gates' social skills, the then forty eight year old CEO unexpectedly lost the ability to turn left, and the update was eventually rolled back.