A US$3 suite of Microsoft software, including entry-level editions of Windows and Office, along with educational software, will help Microsoft compete in emerging markets and extend technology to another billion people worldwide by 2015.

The Student Innovation Suite is the centerpiece of a new Microsoft campaign to rebrand and unify its programs for emerging markets. Under the banner of Unlimited Potential (formerly an employment training program, whose name Microsoft has decided to use more broadly) the company wants to extend computer technology to the "second billion" of the world's population by 2015. (About 1 billion people now have access to PCs.)

Announced by Microsoft Chairman Bill Gates at a Microsoft Government Leaders Forum in Beijing in Apr. 2007, the suite includes Windows XP Starter Edition, a low-end version of Windows XP that supports older microprocessors, a maximum of 128MB of RAM, and Internet access, but no local networking. It also includes Office Home and Student 2007, Math 3.0, Learning Essentials 2.0 for Microsoft Office, and the Windows Live Mail desktop e-mail client. The suite will be available for US$3 (not including media) to governments purchasing bulk orders for students and low-income people. In most cases, the software will be installed on recycled or used computers.

Previously, Windows XP Starter Edition was sold only on new computers. The Student Innovation Suite, however, will be made available through Partners in Learning, a Microsoft program for educational organizations that offers a collection of educational resources and teacher-training programs and that is available in more than 100 countries, including developed countries. As a result, the new suite will be available to low-income people (as defined by their local Partners in Learning program) in countries like the United States, as well as in developing nations.

(For new computers, Windows XP Starter Edition will probably be replaced by the new Vista Starter Edition, which has higher hardware requirements: it requires a minimum of 384MB of RAM and a 15GB hard drive.)

Microsoft sees the inexpensive new suite as a way to reduce piracy and to compete with Linux in price-sensitive emerging economies. In particular, the company wants to make sure its products get considered alongside alternatives such as the One Laptop Per Child (OLPC) program, which is developing a rugged US$175 laptop that will be distributed through government-sponsored programs in emerging countries. The laptop has no hard disk but has 512 MB of flash memory, a Linux OS, and a suite of applications. It can be powered with a built-in hand crank and comes with wireless hardware that can be used to create mesh networks, in which each node is both a wireless receiver and a router capable of extending the network to other computers in its vicinity.

In late Apr. 2007, OLPC head Nicholas Negroponte said the organization is working with Microsoft in an effort to ensure that Windows can also run on the machine.Unlimited Potential is at www.microsoft.com/unlimitedpotential.

Windows Starter Edition is described in "Windows Starter Edition Launched in Asia" on page 5 of the Sept. 2004 Update.

One Laptop Per Child is at www.laptop.org.