According to the $100 laptop initiative founder Nicholas Negroponte, Intel Corporation "should be ashamed of itself" for selling the "Classmate" below cost to drive him out of markets. Both Intel and Professor Negroponte's not for profit organisation, One Laptop per Child, have developed a low cost, robust laptop aimed specifically at school children in the developing world. Negroponte insists Intel had hurt his mission "enormously" only to have Intel's chairman Craig Barrett deny the claims: "We're not trying to drive him out of business. We're trying to bring capability to young people."
Professor Negroponte believes the main problem is that his machine uses a processor designed by Intel's main competitor, AMD. "Intel and AMD fight viciously. We're just sort of caught in the middle." Professor Negroponte says Intel has distributed marketing literature to governments with titles such as "the shortcomings of the One Laptop per Child approach", which outline the supposedly stronger points of the Classmate. Barrett retorted: "Someone at Intel was comparing the Classmate PC with another device being offered in the marketplace. That's the way our business works." He dismissed claims that Intel was trying to put OLPC out of business as "crazy". "There are lots of opportunities for us to work together.”
Countries have until May 31 to place their orders for the first batch of the $176 (£90) laptops, but the eventual aim is to sell the machine to governments of developing countries for $100 (£50). Intel says it already has orders for "thousands" of Classmates, which currently cost over $200 (£100).
News source: BBC News
Professor Negroponte believes the main problem is that his machine uses a processor designed by Intel's main competitor, AMD. "Intel and AMD fight viciously. We're just sort of caught in the middle." Professor Negroponte says Intel has distributed marketing literature to governments with titles such as "the shortcomings of the One Laptop per Child approach", which outline the supposedly stronger points of the Classmate. Barrett retorted: "Someone at Intel was comparing the Classmate PC with another device being offered in the marketplace. That's the way our business works." He dismissed claims that Intel was trying to put OLPC out of business as "crazy". "There are lots of opportunities for us to work together.”
Countries have until May 31 to place their orders for the first batch of the $176 (£90) laptops, but the eventual aim is to sell the machine to governments of developing countries for $100 (£50). Intel says it already has orders for "thousands" of Classmates, which currently cost over $200 (£100).
News source: BBC News
Intel should be ashamed.
sheesh.
if intel is selling so far under cost as to compete with OLPC then they'd be losing omney on them, either way kids get cheap laptops. besides as the article states the classmates are more expensive, twice as expensive in fact.
wichmeans if they choose the one that cost twice as much it's because it offers more than twice the funcitonality, or is worth more per dollar.
And they can afford to sell at a loss. They will knock the self-funded not-for-profit OLPC out easily. Then the market is left with what? Stuck with the one Intel solution.
Go capitalism! Screw the interests of third world education, and make that dollar.
Now, if everyone was willing to work for free just to benefit themselves and their fellow man we would all be living in a utopian world. Sadly that isn't the case, and most likely it won't be for a very long time, if ever. The employees at OLPC, AMD and Intel all need to eat and live, thus the dollar rules supreme, even in cases like this, that on the surface seem very altruistic. AMD and Intel are in this for the money in the long run. If the kids happen to get an education in the process, that's just a bonus.
I don't think what Intel is doing is wrong, and I applaud AMD, Intel and OLPC for their efforts to bring internet porn to the masses, even if it's only to make a few (billion) bucks in the next 10 years.
And they can afford to sell at a loss. They will knock the self-funded not-for-profit OLPC out easily. Then the market is left with what? Stuck with the one Intel solution.
Go capitalism! Screw the interests of third world education, and make that dollar.
Partially true. After Intel kills OLPC's non profit business, Intel will lose interest and stop making them. Then there will be know one making them. Big companies do this all the time to the small guy.
And they can afford to sell at a loss. They will knock the self-funded not-for-profit OLPC out easily. Then the market is left with what? Stuck with the one Intel solution.
Go capitalism! Screw the interests of third world education, and make that dollar.
I'm surprised Intel doesn't have these same children working in sweat shops building components. I'm kinda ashamed to run my core 2 now....
Mikee
however what I'm afraid of is that Intel will undersell the non-profit company, then suddenly jack up the price when the company has gone bankrupt, or worse yet, stop selling them since it's not profitable.
You either want to cater to the market, or you don't.
You either want to cater to the market, or you don't.
You either want to cater to the market, or you don't.
I can think of at least Dell-end and IBM...
IBM (risc)? Via(x86, probably the bes choice)? Sun (sparc)?
Any of these would do. IBM definitely has the money for it.
Via's processors are probably the best suited for the task though as they are low power and low heat compared to their performance. The performance isn't stellar, but not everyone need quad core.
He who sells at a better price, or at least can offer either the same product, nearly the same, or even more dollar-for-dollar, gets to eat the most, etc.
Deal with it.
The point is, underprivileged children will be getting what they apparently need, if it is indeed laptops that they need. Those who can't compete need to shape up or simply pull out.
This is why everyone is so up in arms as Intel sure as hell isn't going to be doing the same thing. And one has to question the ethics of a company who want to compete with a project that is working for no profit.
Don't fool yourself into thinking that AMD isn't playing the publicity game as well, they most certainly are, and now they are just annoyed that that someone else has joined the party. AMD (or their partner in this case) is crying foul because they can't compete. This was a great opportunity for them to corner a potential market, and now they have competition.
Granted, Intel is enormously more prepared to fight a battle of economics compared to AMD, but that in no way means that Intel should not be allowed take a stab at a potentially lucrative market opportunity like this. After all, competition is a good thing, even in charity.
No matter what happens, the kids will still get their $100 laptops. Whether it says AMD or Intel on the box won't matter to them when they are surfin' pr0n on the series of tubes known as the interwebs. (I jest, I jest)
Last edited by Notum on 21 May 2007 - 21:45
OLPC is much better because of it's child-like features and innovative ideas, such as the folding methods, tablet use, 802.11s mesh networking, Sugar OS, webcam and mic, and durable design.
This is a sad day for open source.
pfff. It would be a shame if the olpc is killed by this. IMO they did a really nice thing with the software.
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