MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Uruguay becomes first country to order the “$100 laptop”

The first official order for the so-called “100 US dollars laptop” has been placed by the government of Uruguay which is buying 100,000 of the machines for schoolchildren aged six to 12.

A further 300,000 may be purchased to provide a machine for every child in the country by 2009. The order will be a boost for the One Laptop per Child (OLPC) organisation behind the project which has admitted difficulties getting concrete orders. "I have to some degree underestimated the difference between shaking the hand of a head of state and having a cheque written" Nicholas Negroponte, the founder of the organisation, recently told the New York Times. However, he said he was "delighted" with the first deal. "We commend Uruguay for being the first country to take concrete actions to provide laptops to all its children and teachers and look forward to other countries following this example," he said. The XO laptop, as the machine is known, has been developed to be used primarily by children in the developing world. It is durable, waterproof and can be powered by solar, foot-pump or pull-string powered chargers. It includes a sunlight readable display so that it can be used outside and has no moving parts. OLPC aims to sell the laptop for 100 US dollars or less, but over the last year, the machine's price has steadily increased and now costs 188 US dollars. Governments were initially offered the green and white machines in lots of 250,000. However, this has since changed and there are now a variety of ways that the laptops are sold or distributed. For example, from 12 November, members of the public can buy a machine for themselves as well as one for a child in a developing country. The Give 1 Get 1 (G1G1) programme will initially distribute laptops to Cambodia, Afghanistan, Rwanda and Haiti. Other schemes that have been reported include a deal with the government of Libya to provide a laptop for every child as well as deals with Peru and a sponsorship programme with Italy to provide 50,000 machines to Ethiopia. Although various pilot projects had been announced in the past, such as the purchase of 20,000 laptops by Mongolia, there had not been official confirmation of any country that had signed up for the project. In July, hardware suppliers were told to ramp-up production of all of the components needed to build the low-cost machines. Many believed that the decision meant that the organisation had met or surpassed the three million orders it need to make production viable. However, the latest news suggests this was not the case. The order for 100,000 machines was placed by Uruguay's state-run Laboratorio Tecnológico del Uruguay (Latu) which runs a large scale education and communications project known as Ceibal. The scheme will also provide connectivity to all of the schools involved. Before placing the order, Latu had also evaluated the rival Intel Classmate PC. Initially the XO laptops will be distributed in eight to nine of the country's 19 regions. A further 300,000 machines will provide machines for all of the country's children. "We will also cover the rest of the country later in 2008 and Montevideo in 2009," said Miguel Brechner, president of the organisation.