By Richard Shaffer

It is, as Intel's press release put it, "one of the most remote inhabited places on earth." Parintins, Brazil, is on the outskirts of nowhere. The closest highway ends in óbidos, a day or two downriver. So in 2006, when Intel wirelessly connected the Amazon city to the rest of the online world, chairman Craig Barrett promised that the venture would "bring the expertise of specialists, sophisticated medical imaging, and the world's libraries to a community reachable only by airplane or boat."

The city's "digital makeover" was widely reported, publicizing Intel's billion-dollar, five-year World Ahead Program. The message: Intel is doing good, improving the health and education of the poor around the globe. But Intel's corporate benevolence is also a shrewd investment. Revenue from the United States and Europe has been declining, so the company is nurturing its next crop of customers in Parintins and nearly 200 other places in the developing world. The World Ahead Program is very much about building Intel's future markets.