OLPC: India's New $35 tablet PC
After the great hit by Nano, India has again gained the world’s attention by introducing the world’s cheapest Tablet .the tablet PC having a compact shape and size also looks stylish. It’s a device that can carry with a battery already included, which gives you a remote access wherever you are. Apart from being eye-magnet, it also has some juicy features, including 2GB RAM and 3G. It also including WiFi connectivity, a SIM card slot, and Micro SD card slot, video output to the monitor, Micro USB port, webcam, and it runs on Android 2.1 OS.
The human resource development minister, Kapil Sibal, introduced this Tablet to the Indian public. This tablet is expected to be release in mid-2011. It’s expected to put 1 million units for the students and the educational institutes, by government orders, for a price of $35 which is roughly equal to 1,575 Indian rupees. The total cost of production of this tablet is not known yet, but the estimated price of the parts used is about $50. So $35 will be only a dream for the retail sector. Although $100 can be a comfortable price tag for this tablet for them. This unit is also very power-efficient and uses a 2-watt power supply which is conveniently available almost everywhere.
The tablet is expected to be released in three screen sizes; 5-inch, 7-inch and 9-inches.The host at the unveiling ceremony of the tablet was fairly surprised at the capabilities of a $35-worth device and called it a “fairly impressive package”. It also has the capability of running the Android Operating System smoothly. There was never an instance that the touch screen did not respond at a single time. The audience, the host, and the media were surprised to see the capabilities of the device as compared to its price, which can be considered as if they are distributing it for free.
OLPC, which is One Laptop One Child, and Nicolas Negroponte, expected to sell 1 million XO laptops in India by the end of the year. The previous goal of selling that much mass of low cost laptops; XO-1, was not a good success. The PCs by Intel, known as classmate PCs, has gained a considerable success.
“Free and Open Access”, the Negroponte pledge to his company has helped a lot to reach the dream of a $35 tablet. The real price as estimated is $100, but its planned to retail in India for about $300, which is roughly equal to 13,500 Rs., as a competition. The tablet doesn’t seem to be an answer or a competitor to the OLPC (One Laptop per child). The tablet seems to be a member of the family which is dedicated to create prosperity and peace through transforming education to everyone. This tablet also declared a full-access to all its technology and that is at a zero-cost.
Now the country head of OLPC India, Sanjay Jha, has declared that OLPC is intending to sell 1 Million laptops at the price of 15,000 by the end of the year.
