Production of $100 laptop begins

San Francisco (CA) - After a couple bumps in the road, the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) initiative has begun its path to helping children in impoverished nations.

The OLPC foundation aims to put inexpensive laptop computers in the hands of children in third-world countries. It has received orders from multiple countries, some of which would need hundreds of thousands to make the plan viable.

Originally dubbed the "$100 laptop", the OLPC group said earlier this year it would need to up the price to around $170 per unit. The laptop has very basic software on it and comes in a green-and-white casing. It has been named the XO laptop.

Another obstacle was an opposition from Intel, which ran its own "Classmate PC" initiative to compete with OLPC. The chip manufacturer has since come to an agreent with OLPC and is helping with the production of the XO laptop.

The group said previously that it would need more than three million orders for the project to be possible. The current plan is to have the XO laptopss available by October of this year.