Its main aim was to raise awareness of the benefits of using information and communications technology in schools. Organisers say that, having done that, they will cease operating from 31 December.

ICL, Sun Microsystems, Cisco Systems, and the Daily Telegraph founded UK NetYear during 1997.

In a joint statement, they said: "UK NetYear has made an invaluable and groundbreaking contribution to education. It has achieved its aims of raising awareness of the opportunities ICT brings, and started the process of delivering the resources needed for the future of our children.

"As individual companies we are all fully committed to continuing our work in education and hope the spirit of UK NetYear will be seamlessly absorbed into the National Grid for Learning."

Grid for Learning

Its Executive Chairman, David Wimpress, said: "UK NetYear was conceived nearly two years ago at a time when there was a need for a well defined strategy for information and communications technology in education. We have been instrumental in opening up this debate and in supporting the fledgling National Grid for Learning.

"The new administration, under Tony Blair, quickly made it clear that they needed no persuading to invest in technology in education and, in his endorsement of UK NetYear, the prime minister expressed his intention of lifting educational standards in Britain to the level of the best in the world.

"We are pleased, therefore, that the government has now overtaken UK NetYear and is filling the void that existed when UK NetYear was conceived."

Guide goes on

The UK NetYear Website will continue to be available up to the end of January. After that its 'How To' guide pack - delivered to more than 9,000 schools but now being revised - will be available free through the British Educational Communications and Technology Agency (Becta).

More than 4,000 schools are said to have taken advantage of the UK NetYear/AOL offer of free Internet accounts for registered schools.

Their accounts will continue and, from next month, the offer will be extended to all schools in the UK, regardless of whether they had registered with UK NetYear. ExcitePost, the special educational free e-mail for life, is also being made available to all schools.

UK NetYear organised the World Cup Internet Competition in June and ran a week of masterclasses featuring live, online interviews with experts and celebrities. It also funded the teachers' guide section of BBC Education's Computers Don't Bite series.