Facebook ready to spend billions to bring whole world online: Zuckerberg

Left, Mexico' s President Enrique Pena Nieto and Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg pose for photographs at the presidential palace as Zuckerberg's wife Priscilla Chan, fourth from right, stands near, in Mexico City on Friday. Photo: Reuters

Facebook Inc is prepared to spend billions of dollars to reach its goal of bringing the Internet to everyone on the planet, Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said on Friday.

"What we really care about is connecting everyone in the world," Zuckerberg said at an event in Mexico City hosted by Mexican billionaire Carlos Slim.

"Even if it means that Facebook has to spend billions of dollars over the next decade making this happen, I believe that over the long term its gonna be a good thing for us and for the world."

Around 3 billion people will have access to the Internet by the end of 2014, according to International Telecommunications Union (ITU) statistics. Almost half that, 1.3 billion people, use Facebook.

Facebook, the world's largest social networking company, launched its Internet.org project last year to connect billions of people without Internet access in places such as Africa and Asia by working with phone operators.