BusinessDay... the voice of business: ‘$100 laptop’ runs into more murky waters in Nigeria

‘$100 laptop’ runs into more murky waters in Nigeria
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CHIDIEBERE NWANKWO on 13 December, 2007 01:00:00
 
After suffering a major setback in the Nigerian market through the termination
of purchase agreement between Nigeria and the Massachusetts Institute of
Technology (MIT) Media Lab, facilitators of the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC)
project, the project has received another major set back.
This time, OLPC has been sued for an alleged patent infringement by Lagos
Analysis Corp (Lancor). According to a report, Lancor alleges that OLPC used
without permission, the company’s design for a multilingual keyboard design.
Ade Oyegbola, chief executive officer and founder was quoted as saying that
Lancor brought the suit in Nigeria because that is where the design is patented,
but notes that Lancor also expects to sue in the United States .
Oyegbola says his company worked for several years to develop the Konyin
Nigeria Multilingual Keyboard. Some observers say the suit is nothing more than
a ploy designed to drag royalty fees from Nicholas Negroponte’s One Laptop Per
Child Foundation.
Recently, government officials opted for Intel’s Classmate PC over the OLPC
laptop, also known as XO.
The laptop initially tagged $100 laptop because of its proposed cost of $100
(about N12,800) has now had its cost moved up to $188 (about N24,064). The
project has received growing condemnation from some stakeholders who noted that
the quality is not up to standard.
Analysts say competition from commercial laptops could challenge efforts by the
One Laptop Per Child project to supply inexpensive laptops to children in
developing markets.
Jimson Olufuye, president, Information Technology Association of Nigeria (ITAN)
had disclosed that the increase in the price of the laptop further decreases the
usefulness of the system to Nigerian children.
According to him, if well planned, indigenous hardware assemblers could
distribute laptops with basic developmental tools that would compete favourably
with OLPC laptops cost-wise.
"There are no developmental tools in it (OLPC), but we want to ensure that our
kids are able to use systems that can be used to develop programmes. We cannot
just be consuming we should be able to develop," Olufuye stated.
While ITAN discountenances the one laptop per child (OLPC) initiative for its
lack of provision of development tools to students, it states that equipping
students need more than just allowing them to work with laptop.
A news agency reported Wayan Vota, former director of the Geekcorps
international tech-development organization and current editor of the OLPCNews
blog as saying: "Where does it end? It started out at $130, then it was $148,
then it was $176, now it’s $188 - what’s next, $200? You have these
governments who were looking at this original, fanciful $100-per-child figure,
now we’re going up towards or maybe past $200."
Also speaking Chris Uwaje, an IT expert said the benefits derivable from the
OLPC initiative are limited and does not justify the increase in cost. He noted
that initiative would only reduce Nigerian children to consumers and the tools
inherent in the laptop do not support development and research.