Spectrum, a local technology company headquartered in Newport News, VA – www.sptrm.com, is developing a powerful hardware-based solution for Chromebooks in education. Our innovation, Go-Box Chrome – www.go-box.com, which is locally developed and manufactured, will ultimately benefit Virginia and national K-12 schools to more effectively handle the mass influx of Chromebook laptops that now permeate more than 50% of all classrooms. Spectrum is excited to be a local company helping schools nationwide with this solution.
In short, each Chromebook must be configured to ensure new devices have the correct school-specific settings. Also, an OS reset and reconfiguration is required to ensure that students getting a reassigned device receive a clean laptop without technical issues, viruses, or inappropriate content from the previous student user. The process to enroll, wipe and reconfigure each Chromebook isn’t overly difficult on a laptop or two, but when multiplied by the thousands of devices in a single school district, you have a problem of scale that frequently takes an IT department weeks or months to complete. It’s a clear problem that we set out to fix.
Our hardware-based solution automates the initial configuration and also cuts the wipe + reconfiguration process on thousands of Chromebooks down from a few weeks to a few days – enabling the school IT professionals to focus on other more important technology related tasks. Go-Box Chrome is currently concluding beta testing and production units are scheduled for public release in late spring 2017.
The Virginia Domestic Market Expansion Program (DMEP) has helped fund a number of development activities and connected Spectrum with local development and professional resources, ultimately providing new job opportunities in the Commonwealth. DMEP is managed by GENEDGE which is a chartered institution of the Commonwealth of Virginia that assists Virginia and Washington DC industries to innovate, compete and grow.