Intel Resigns From OLPC Board?

> Hello All,
>
> The wall street journal is reporting that Intel has resigned from  
> the OLPC
> board and has canceled plans to develop an Intel based OLPC computer  
> over
> demands that it stop selling its competitor classmate computer.  Can  
> anyone
> confirm this?
>
> Ron Teitelbaum
> Squeak News Team Leader

>
> On Jan 3, 2008, at 4:47 PM, Ron Teitelbaum wrote:
>
>> Hello All,
>>
>> The wall street journal is reporting that Intel has resigned from  the
>> OLPC
>> board and has canceled plans to develop an Intel based OLPC computer
>> over
>> demands that it stop selling its competitor classmate computer.  Can
>> anyone
>> confirm this?
>>
>> Ron Teitelbaum
>> Squeak News Team Leader
>
>
> Intel Resigns From Board
> Of One Laptop Per Child
> By STEVE STECKLOW
> January 3, 2008 8:17 p.m.
> Intel Corp. says it has dropped out of a non-profit project to sell
> millions of low-cost laptops in the developing world, citing
> disagreements with the organization's founder, Nicholas Negroponte.
>
> The divorce culminates a stormy relationship between the Santa Clara,
> Calif.-based chipmaker and the One Laptop Per Child project, which
> recently began selling a low-cost laptop in African, Latin American  and
> other countries. The two sides had been feuding over Intel's  aggressive
> marketing of a low-cost laptop of its own design in many of  the same
> countries that the non-profit had been targeting. The OLPC  machine uses a
> microprocessor from Intel's chief competitor, Advanced  Micro Devices Inc.
>
> After more than a year of public sniping between Intel and OLPC, Intel
> joined OLPC's board in July and had been planning on announcing a new
> low-cost, OLPC-designed laptop based on an Intel microprocessor at  next
> week's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. But the company  has quit
> the board and scrapped the new machine, according to Intel  spokesman
> Chuck Mulloy.
>
> "We've reached a philosophical impasse with OLPC," he said. He added  that
> Mr. Negroponte had demanded that Intel stop selling its own  designed
> laptop, known as the Classmate, and to stop supplying its  chips in other
> laptops marketed to schoolchildren in developing  countries. "We can't
> accommodate that request," Mr. Mulloy said. He  said Intel favors offering
> "many solutions" to developing countries,  not just the OLPC laptop. He
> also said dropping the Classmate would  hurt Intel's relationships with
> overseas manufacturers and suppliers.  Tens of thousands of Classmates
> have been sold.
>
> Mr. Negroponte, a professor on leave from the Massachusetts Institute  of
> Technology, couldn't be reached for comment. The simmering dispute
> between Intel and Mr. Negroponte was detailed in a page-one story in  this
> newspaper in November.
>
> The concept of a low-cost laptop for the world's poorest  schoolchildren
> has sparked great interest from world leaders and  technology companies
> ever since Mr. Negroponte first proposed it three  years ago as a way to
> bridge the technology divide between rich and  poor countries. He vowed to
> get such a device, costing just $100, into  the hands of up to 150 million
> children by this year. But although  OLPC has managed to develop an
> innovative machine, it has failed so  far to achieve its target price --  
> the current model sells overseas  for $188 -- and to attract large orders
> from governments because of  increasing competition. As sales problems
> mounted, the project  recently reversed course on its plan not to sell the
> device to  American consumers. In November, it began selling pairs of
> laptops to  U.S. and Canadian consumers for $399 under a program in which
> buyers  could keep one and give the other to a student in a poor country
> like  Haiti. The program ended on Monday. OLPC has called the program --  
> known as "Give One. Get One." -- successful, but hasn't disclosed  total
> sales figures.
>
> Mr. Negroponte serves on a committee to protect the editorial  integrity
> of Dow Jones & Co., the owner of The Wall Street Journal  that was
> acquired last month by News Corp.
>
> Write to Steve Stecklow at [hidden email]
>
>
>
>
>
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