Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates

Microsoft is planning to add 3,000 engineers in India to its own workforce as well as to those of its Indian partners and vendors over the next three years, Chairman Bill Gates said Wednesday.

Gates said at an industry meeting that the workforce in India will increase to 7,000 from 4,000 currently.

Microsoft currently has 2,700 employees in India. It has partnership agreements with Indian software companies Infosys Technologies Ltd., Wipro Ltd. and Satyam Computer Services Ltd..

Established in 1990, Microsoft India’s revenues are only $199 million, compared with Microsoft’s total revenues of $37 billion. The company has an India Development Centre in Hyderabad, but most of the work is done from its headquarters in Redmond, near Seattle.

Earlier on Tuesday, Gates and his wife Belinda had reviewed the Avahan initiative on AIDS for which the Gates Foundation has already pledged $112.4 million.