Sylvania brings new Atom-based netbook to market in record time with Ubuntu Netbook Remix

This week I have the pleasure of attending the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) in San Francisco at the Moscone Center. You can find me and the rest of the Canonical gang showing off Ubuntu MID Edition and Netbook Remix in the Moblin Community Area.

Speaking of mobile, since launching the new version earlier in the year we’ve had a steady flood of interest from users and partners alike. This week is sure to kick it up a notch!

Sylvania is making its g netbook available in U.S. retail stores nationwide — shipping with Ubuntu Netbook Remix. Netbooks are relatively new in the U.S. and huge growth is expected. We’re excited to be part of this announcement.

Here’s how we’re involved.

In the OEM Services team at Canonical, primarily based in Lexington, MA and Taipei, Taiwan, we engage with manufacturers to produce images of Ubuntu specific to their hardware – ensuring high reliability. We also add software at the manufacturer’s request such as licensed media codecs and/or applications that we do not ship in standard Ubuntu. So for a company like Sylvania it is a customized version of Ubuntu delivered via a commercial engagement.

It is a great honor for the team here to see with this announcement that there are Intel Atom(R)-based machines going into market running Ubuntu. This marks a major milestone for the OEM Services team and is the culmination of a huge amount of investment and effort.

By the end of the year, Ubuntu will be available pre-installed on machines on thousands of shelves and digital marketplaces around the world. Consumers will have a real choice and we will continue working to ensure that choice is Ubuntu.

If you are in the San Francisco area, stop by and see us at IDF and check out the new Sylvania g and other cool mobile computers running Ubuntu.

– Jon Melamut, OEM Services