The Massachusetts Institute of Technology has inked a deal with Taiwan’s Quanta to manufacture the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) $100 laptop designed by the MIT Media Lab’s Nicholas Negroponte. Quanta is the world’s largest laptop manufacturer, manufacturing systems for HP, Apple, Dell, Gateway, Sony, IBM, Sharp, Fujistu, and other major makers. Quanta will have manufactured nearly one-third of the laptop and notebook computer systems built during 2005.
Under the terms of the deal, Quanta has agreed to devote substantial engineering resources to the OLPC project during the first half of 2006 with the goal of bringing the OPC system to market by the end of 2006. The initial pilot will put one million units in seven culturally diverse countries (China, India, Brazil, Argentina, Egypt, Nigeria, and Thailand) with additional machines allocated to developer communities in other selected countries. The deal enables Quanta to pursue development of a commercial version of the OLPC: the current OLPC project would not have machines available for sale to individuals, but would instead be sold to governments for distribution to children by schools and other organizations.
The OLPC systems are Linux-based and feature a 500 MHz processor, a screen capable of both full color and high-contrast black and white display, 128 MB of RAM and 512 MB of flash memory, four USB ports, wireless broadband (the systems will be configured to create and join impromptu mesh network with other OLPCs right out of the box), and will be able to operate off wind-up power.
