MIT developing $100 laptops for children in the developing world
The mission: to make laptops as ubiquitous as cell phones in technology-deprived regions.

In a rural Cambodian village where the homes lack electricity, the nighttime darkness is pierced by the glow from laptops that children bring from school. “When the kids bring them home and open them up, it’s the brightest light source in the home,” said MIT Media Lab founder Nicholas Negroponte. “Parents love it.” Negroponte and some MIT colleagues are hard at work on a project they hope will brighten the lives and prospects of hundreds of millions of developing world kids.

The laptops would be mass-produced in orders of no smaller than 1 million units and bought by governments, which would distribute them. Three corporate partners have committed an initial $2 million apiece to the initiative and pledged to serve as suppliers for the “one laptop per child” project: Sunnyvale, California-based Advanced Micro Devices Inc., which will bring expertise in processors; “Do No Evil” search engine king Google; and News Corp., Rupert Murdoch’s media company with global satellite capabilities.