NextBillion.net - Development Through Enterprise - Intel and the OLPC: A Conflict Waiting to Happen - Comments

Intel/OLPC

Bill Kramer — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 10:45:20 -0500

Wayan, Steve, and Cat add great stuff to the post. Nick Negroponte's press release made a strong statement on one of Wayan and Cat's principal points about the nature of commerce. "As we said in the past, we view the children as a mission; Intel views them as a market. The benefit to the departure of Intel from the OLPC board is a renewed clarity in purpose and the marketplace; we will continue to focus on our mission of providing every child with an opportunity for learning." Well, to my mind, that suggests first that the OLPC find a way, fast, to get out of the sales game before all the amazing achievements to date are buried by what even they see as non-core elements; and second, increase efforts, as Wayan and Cat say, to bring greater efficacy and cost efficiency to other parts of the process. Others who know Nick better, or are closer to the OLPC effort will have to judge whether ego and stubbornness are getting in the way of success here. One does, however, get a strong whiff in the press release of a frame of mind that I know well from lots of observation both inside and outside the academic/non-profit world -- the our-mission-is-better-than-your-mission syndrome. It's a stance that at the very least is off-putting, and is, very often, a killer. Steve raises another interesting question, should you keep your friends close and your enemies closer, or not? It was at least worth a shot that Intel, with all its savvy, technologically and market-wise, would bring real benefit to OLPC, despite the dangers. But, as I said in the original post, I suspect that it was not sold well inside Intel and was, therefore, likely to fail in time.

Competition is healthy

Wayan @ OLPC News — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 22:26:25 -0500

Bill, I was saddened by OLPC's stated reason for the Intel departure - Intel's support of other low-cost computing options. Competition is good, its what drives innovation and improvements. If OLPC is really about changing education, it would be focused on the same result - faster, better, cheaper hardware for educational software. It's original mission statement did have such a goal: "We are non-profit: constructionism is our goal; XO is our means of getting there. It is a very cool, even revolutionary machine, and we are very proud of it. But we would also be delighted if someone built something better, and at a lower price." .html... Where did it get lost?

With Friends like These...

Cat Laine — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 18:28:37 -0500

Isn't it somewhat common sense not to invite onto your board of directors an entity who wants to compete with you/take your market share? Intel clearly has a conflict of interest. I don't see how it could be a champion, advocate or whatever it is OLPC was expecting from its board members given its simultaneous desire to market the Classmate.

On a side note: There's an interesting post on CNET's Crave Blog about what OLPC can anticipate for its troubles of "sparking a revolution". In a nutshell, it will flounder as bigger, more experienced companies with better business models dominate the sector.

XO computer

Steve Cisler — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 16:59:51 -0500

The XO plus the olpc org's feud with Intel has generated an amazing amount of comments and opinion pieces. In December I decided one of the reasons is that the whole XO project is very, very open. Maybe not as transparent as some would like but so much more than, say, the development of the iPhone. So it's going to attract much more attention from fanatic supporters, cynics, trolls, and more-or-less objective journalists. Plus Negroponte sought out the media for publicity. Note the interviews with Fortune (Fitzpatrick) and NYTimes (Markoff--2 articles) and probably others following the Intel pullout. By the way there are quite a lot more details on what happened in Peru, according to a savvy critic of the XO in Lima--not that he's siding with the woman from Intel.

Intel and the OLPC: A Conflict Waiting to Happen

Rob Katz — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 16:44:23 -0500

Guest blogger Bill Kramer is principal of The Global Challenge Network, LLC, an executive education and training company. From 2001 through mid-2007, he worked on pro-poor business strategies with WRI. Previously, Bill founded a non-profit focusing on the relationship of knowledge to economic development and enjoyed a long career in the private sector, founding a dozen companies, most of which were in the book business.

By Bill Kramer

Intel and the OLPC project have parted ways. The proximate cause, according to the report in The New York Times on Saturday, January 5, was the effort by an Intel salesperson in Peru to get the Education Ministry to switch from the XO to Intel's Classmate PC for primary schools. This was interference with an existing contract for the XO and contravening prior Intel agreements not to compete directly, nor to disparage the XO through one-on-one comparison of the machines. David Kirkpatrick from Fortune has an in-depth interview with OLPC head Nick Negroponte that goes into even more detail.

The failure of this partnership is not surprising to most observers, however disappointing it may be. First, Intel, as readers of Next Billion will know, was resistant to joining the OLPC effort, but yielded last year, and agreed to cooperate in developing a new chipset and machine, the Intel XO, which was to be unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show which opened this past weekend (also see this story on the CES’ greening initiative). It was going to be a rough ride for the partners. OLPC and Intel already had a history, strong personalities at their respective centers, and, on OLPC's side, a powerful vision driven by education, not commerce, as Nick Negoponte said loud and often.

These divergent visions are the second reason for this breakup. In Intel's statement on its departure from OLPC, Chuck Mulloy of Intel said, in part, "that at the core of this is a philosophical impasse about how the market gets served." Spot on, in my view. And my sympathies frankly lie with Intel on this particular issue (while, at the same time, the press report suggests that Intel behaved badly in other respects here).

My earlier posts on the OLPC suggested that the philanthropic/education orientation of the venture would prove shaky in the competitive environment of computer hardware, and that reliance on governments as the primary market could prove a flawed approach to commercial success. Prof. Negroponte has remarked ruefully that politician's headline-seeking public "contracts" with OLPC have, in a number of cases, not been followed by checks being written. More experienced (and perhaps cynical) businesspeople could have (and may well have) foretold this outcome.

(This post continues past the break; click "Read More" to continue)