An article in the June 5, 2008, issue of Business Week addresses some of the challenges faced by the One Laptop Per Child project. Not surprisingly, these are same the challenges that any large-scale technology project in the developing world must overcome.
The article points out that:
The article also describes the culture clash that arose within the OLPC project between Open Source advocates and those who wanted to partner with Microsoft. Open Source software is ideal for a project like this, which tries to reduce costs as much as possible, while giving students access to tools, including the software itself. But governments like known entities, and Microsoft is that, especially when it negotiates with governments to reduce software licensing costs.
In summary, executing a massive technology project in the developing world is complicated and has many, many variables, some of them unforeseen. The number of stakeholders involved is enormous. There are many potential points of failure. To succeed, projects must be planned carefully and resourced appropriately, and project implementers must pay attention to more than just the technology. They also have to consider the cultures they’re entering, the systems already in place and the people who will be working with the technology. In other words, it’s not easy executing an ambitious ICT for development project like One Laptop Per Child.
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