Amazon.com will start selling One Laptop Per Child’s low-cost XO notebook computer as part of the Give One, Get One program OLPC developed last year, according to an official from OLPC.
The non-profit organization started Give One, Get One as a way to raise money to send laptops to school kids in poor countries. The idea is that a person pays for two of the XO laptops developed by OLPC. One is sent to the buyer, and another is donated to a child in a developing country.
This year, OLPC opted to team up with a Web e-tailer instead of running the program itself, said Matt Keller, director of Europe, Middle East and Africa at OLPC, in an interview Wednesday.
Amazon.com will start selling XO laptops under the Give One, Get One program in late November, around the time of Thanksgiving in the U.S. Sales will likely extend through to around the end of December.
“We’re a small group of people,” said Keller, explaining the rationale for working with Amazon.com.
OLPC is run by a small group of people, he said. There are a few thousand volunteers that help out with software development and other projects, but the core group itself is just 25 people.