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India Unveils World’s Cheapest $10 Laptop

The ‘world’s cheapest laptop’, developed in India, was unveiled by Union Minister for Human Resources Development Arjun Singh at the Tirupati temple on Tuesday evening.

The laptop, jointly developed by several organisations, such as the University Grants Commission, the Indian Institute of Technology-Madras, and the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore, will be priced at around $10 to $20 (about Rs 500 to Rs 1,000), officials said. This laptop is expected to reach the market in about six months.

The project has already created a buzz in the laptop industry across the world.

The laptop has 2 GB onboard memory with wireless Internet connectivity. To make it useful for the students, especially in the rural areas, the scientists have made it low power consuming gadget.

The $10 laptop is being seen as India’s reply to One Laptop per Child‘s XO and Classmate of Intel. The XO, created by scientist Nicholas Negroponte and MIT Media Lab was originally targeted to cost only $100 but by the time it was ready to enter the market its cost went up to $188. The Classmate notebook PC from Intel was priced at $ 300 a piece.

In contrast, the Indian government’s effort to market lap top at only $10 has caused a flutter in the international laptop market and many players are curious to know the details of the costing and how Indians managed to keep the cost so low.