Intel pulls out of OLPC project

Everyone's favorite on-again-off-again couple, Intel and the OLPC project are back in the news again and this time, it looks like the breakup might be permanent. As you'll recall, after months of marketing the rival Classmate PC and badmouthing the OLPC project in the press, Intel and the OLPC folks buried the hatchet back in July, with Intel contributing funds to the OLPC project and even joining the board of directors. Intel clearly had its eye on the next-gen OLPC XO (as the current model uses an AMD chip) and was even said to be developing a mobile platform expressly for this purpose. Despite this fact, it continued to market the Classmate PC, competing directly with the XO in a number of markets. Apparently OLPC founder Nicholas Negroponte wasn't having any of that and requested that Intel either stop selling the Classmate PC or hit the road. And hit the road they did. "We've reached a philosophical impasse with OLPC," Intel spokesperson Chuck Mulloy told the Wall Street Journal. While it's certainly unfortunate that the collaboration didn't work out, it always seemed strange to us that two fierce competitors had suddenly decided to partner up, so we can't say that we're all that surprised.

For more on the announcement:
- see this Wall Street Journal article (sub. req.)