CES: OLPC would welcome Intel back

The One Laptop Per Child project
would welcome Intel back if the chip maker returned to the group, the head of
OLPC said Tuesday.

The statement came just days after Intel
quit the group's board of directors over what it said was OLPC's insistence
that it abandon a rival low-cost laptop developed by Intel, the Classmate
PC. OLPC has said it asked no such thing of Intel, and that it welcomes
the Classmate PC because the more low-cost laptops there are available, the
more likely they'll get into the hands of children in the developing world.

"It was very unfortunate what happened with Intel and I hope there's a
way of rebuilding it in the future because there's no interest in OLPC pushing
Intel out. It just is not in our interest. Our goal is to get this to as many
children as possible," said Nicholas Negroponte, chairman of OLPC, in an
interview.

He called it unfortunate that Intel made statements that OLPC asked the chip
maker to stop working on the Classmate PC. "The picture that painted was
one of OLPC being anti-competition, which is ridiculous. We'd like to see as
many laptops out there as possible and kids have the widest choice possible,"
he said.

Intel would be willing to talk with OLPC, said Agnes Kwan, an Intel manager.
But she added that the organizational break-up came about because of differences
that the groups have been so far unable to resolve.

The OLPC Project started as an attempt to build a $100 laptop aimed at kids
in poor nations, but the laptop from the group, the XO, will likely end up costing
nearly double that amount, initially. The organizers of the effort, led by academics
and researchers from the Massachusetts
Institute of Technology (MIT), hope heavy volume sales of the laptops will
drive down costs.

The goal of OLPC is to make sure nobody misses out on the benefits of computing.
The fear is that the price of a PC is keeping too many people in developing
countries from learning how the software, Internet and communications benefits
of computing can improve their economies, job prospects and lives, or that poor
countries will fall further and further behind the modern world due to their
inability to access computers, a conundrum commonly referred to as the digital
divide.

IDG News Service

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