One Laptop Per Child, a non-profit group that produces low-cost laptops and distributes them to students in the developing world, has ended its relationship with Intel, which sells its own low-cost student laptop, according to a report on Bloomberg.com.
Ars Technica offers an analysis of what has sometimes been a wrestling match between the two parties over how to go about making laptops cheap enough to become ubiquitous in schools around the world. Apparently Nicholas Negroponte, who started One Laptop Per Child and is the former director of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Media Lab, wanted Intel to stop selling its Classmate PC and focus that energy on supporting the One Laptop Per Child machine, called the XO-1. Intel officials, for their part, have said that competition in low-cost laptop manufacturing will be the best way to achieve both projects’ goals.
When Intel first announced teaming up with One Laptop Per Child in July, the chip-manufacturing company said it would “explore collaborations involving technology and educational content” and join the board of the project. But it looks like the One Laptop Per Child project will continue to use processors from Intel’s rival, AMD.
A spokeswoman for One Laptop Per Child could not immediately be reached for comment by The Chronicle. —Jeffrey R. Young
