The female programmers I have worked with and studied with have never been in the top half in terms of knowledge in the field or the ability to produce good solutions or code. They are not bad but just not as good as most men.

What was the point of this statement given the context?

He has stated that all women he has worked with have been less competent then the men. Okay, let's take that into the context of the conversation. The conversation is about all women in the industry. So he is saying that all women he has worked with have been relatively incompetent, in a conversation that is discussing all women. Is it possible that people could interpret his statement to be a more generalized statement that applies to all women, given the context of the conversation?

He even goes on to make a general statement about all men and women right after making the statement quoted above.

The reason for this is that men get so involved in things that they do. They become nerds. Women work hard. It is hard to work hard and compete with people who do this because they absolutely love writing code (the top half) .