Microsoft Chief Executive Steve Ballmer was unperturbed a day after rival Apple Inc shot past his firm as the world's biggest tech company by market value and said his aim was on developing a good product line and making more products.

My focus is on everyday ... what we should be doing to our product line, where do we go, how do we make products more innovative, Ballmer, who is on an Asian visit, told reporters in the Indian capital on Thursday.

I will make more profits and certainly there is no technology company in the planet which is as profitable as we are.

Shares in Cupertino, California-based Apple had risen as much 2.8 percent on Nasdaq on Wednesday, as Microsoft shares floundered, briefly pushing Apple's market value above $229 billion, ahead of its longtime rival.

Microsoft, whose operating system runs on more than 90 percent of the world's personal computers, has not been able to match growth rates from its heyday 1990s. Its stock is down 20 percent from 10 years ago.

Apple, which struggled for many years to get its products into the mainstream, resorted to a $150 million investment from the much larger Microsoft in 1997 in order to keep it afloat. At that time, Microsoft's market value was more than five times that of Apple.

It's a long game, we have good competitors ... we too are a very good competitor, Ballmer said. We are executing very well and that is going to lead to great products and great success.

He said Microsoft would have to accelerate plans for the entertainment and devices businesses.

The world's largest software maker has been brushed aside by Apple's iPhone and Google Inc's Android operating system in the fast-growing smartphone market.

Worldwide, Google's Android passed Microsoft's Windows as the fourth most popular smartphone operating system in the first quarter, according to research firm Gartner, behind Apple, RIM and Nokia's Symbian system.

(Reporting by Devidutta Tripathy; Editing by Ranjit Gangadharan)

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