On Tuesday morning Peru's president Alan Garcia updated business leaders on the current state of OLPC in the country and the government's plans for the next 12 to 18 months.
Until now, we have acquired 140,000 computers, of which 40,000 have been delivered and 100,000 are still in the process of distribution; and for next year, there is a budget to purchase 150,000 more computers.
Pointing to a OLPC Peru future
As previously mentioned it's really challenging to find information about the actual number of deployed XOs in the various countries. For example based on previous media reports and the numbers on the wiki.laptop.org Deployment page I had certainly assumed for more than 40,000 Peruvian children to be using their XOs already.
On the other hand it looks as though Peru has upgraded its total order volume from 260,000 XOs (as reported back in December 2007) to 290,000 units.
With regard to the cost of the purchase one report contained an interesting bit of information:
...una inversión de 116 millones de nuevo soles, monto que permitirá la compra de 152 mil 200 computadoras portátiles con sus respectivos accesorios.
This means that Peru apparently allocates 116 million Nuevos Soles (~38 million USD) to purchase the next 152,200 XOs which results in one XO costing ~$250. With the current unit cost of an XO apparently being $203~$204 I'm wondering what these "accompanying accessories" are that cost almost $50: maybe solar panels, extra power-plugs, spare parts,...?
The last piece of information concerns what might possibly be the first appearance of Give 1 Get 1 outside of North America:
...el Ministerio de Educación puso en marcha, luego de detallar los avances y logros pedagógicos de los niños que han sido beneficiados con una OLPC, el programa "2 por 1" Compra una Laptop y dona una, que consiste en comprar dos computadoras portátiles por mil 610 nuevos soles: una para un escolar de escasos recursos y la otra para el empresario que la adquiere.
It basically says that the Ministry of Education announced a "2 for 1" program which allows Peruvians to donate 1,610 Nuevos Soles (~$530) and thereby sending one XO to a deserving school with another one being sent to themselves.
If $530 is what is really takes to Give 1 Get 1 then I'm wondering why the upcoming G1G1 v2 will cost $399 and therefore turn into a Give (Almost) 1 Get 1...
Recent Comments
Something completely different:
OLPC Mali: Kids Take Home the XO Laptops
http://blog.laptopmag.com/olpc-mali-kids-take-home-the-xo-laptops
Winter
The extras include school servers, for sure, and possibly gang chargers. OLPC doesn't do electricity or Internet, but it does training and some other support services.
The Peruvian "2 por 1" plan is not the same as the OLPC GiveOneGetOne. We don't know what extra costs the Peruvian government plans to cover for the extra money. Maybe electricity and Internet? Somebody should ask on the OLPC-Sur Spanish-language mailing list.