Lenovo to refocus on Chinese market

Now that the leadership of Lenovo is back in the hands of Chinese executives, the PC maker says it plans to pay more attention to its home market of China and other emerging markets, according to a report in The Wall Street Journal.

It cut ties with its American CEO Bill Amelio earlier this week after a dreadful financial quarter in which the company lost $97 million. Chairman Yan Yuanqing has taken over as chief executive and company co-founder Liu Chuanzhi is returning to become chairman of the board.

Liu blames the company's current woes on the worldwide financial crisis and Lenovo's heavy investment in the commercial computing space with long lists of corporate customers. Though the company has made huge strides to become the fourth-largest PC maker by volume in the world, its presence in the consumer market outside China has been minimal until recently. A year ago the company introduced a line of consumer laptops and desktops, and more recently, a Netbook.

Now Lenovo will renew its focus in its home market and emerging markets to include individual and smaller businesses customers, Liu told the Journal.

The company will remain an international company and plans to keep its dual headquarters in Beijing and Morrisville, N.C., according to Liu. But what's unclear is what this means for the company's nascent consumer business.

[Joetwopointoh]

And we would do well to focus on our own market (from both a manufacturing and marketing perspective) as well. Of course many call this thinking "protectionist". What I can't figure out is why they don't get that it's always been a great idea.

[BigGuns149]

I don't know who your nebulous "they" is, but I think that the issue is that protectionism is an archaic idea that didn't really serve almost anyone well and inaccurately presumes that all trade is a zero sum game. Trade between countries doesn't have to have losers. It is quite possible for both sides to benefit. Global trade fosters interdependence, which makes conflicts between countries less tenable and opens up markets for everyone.

Protectionists would have us spend Billions if not trillions of dollars to protect industries that our country is well suited to do when in *many* cases the cost of protecting said industry would cost more than to retrain those employees to work in something our country does better.

[globalist_agenda]

The Global Elite and New World Order agree. It's not protectionist if China buys local and subsidizes their own companies. It is only protectionist if the U.S. does this. The U.S. made a tragic mistake after WW II of being a net exporter of goods and having a budget surplus. It wisely corrected these mistakes starting in the 1970's by becoming a net importer and running budget defcits. George Bush wisely accelerated this process and sacrificed the U.S. economy to bring the rest of the world into into economic prosperity. Obama is continuing the policy of "Buy foreign at any cost.". Right in my own back yard we are building a new bridge with superior Chinese steel that is guaranteed to last at least until construction is completed.

[sanenazok]

Start making steel at a profit in the US with union labor and pesky EPA regs and then you can talk. I don't think anyone's talking about Chinese subsidies for Lenovo. They want to now focus their products for the Chinese market. So low, low quality and low low prices. Certain, Lenovo should be allowed to enter the low margin market. More power to them.

Is there a Chinese language OS/2? I think they need a cheap OS to compete in the developing world, might as well go with their own.

[w_bee]

>> Is there a Chinese language OS/2? I think they need a cheap OS to compete in the developing world,

Who needs OS/2?
There are much better alternatives: Liunx and FreeBSD.

[anakin2006]

with the population growth after WW2 in US, without the global expansion, there might have had lots of ppl unhappy about the economy in US. in order to keep the majority happy, US has not choice, otherwise, EU would do it. it is ludicrous to blame BUSH on this as it is the consensus from the both parties, wall street, and academia.

[Commander_Spock]

Are you correct in saying that "(President) Obama is continuing the policy of "Buy foreign at any cost." when the "the Dassault Falcon 7X" corporate jet that was ordered from France by CITI BANK came up for questioning by both the Senate and the House of Representatives it is believed!

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/01/26/citi-jet-purchase-50-mill_n_160807.html

[Commander_Spock]

Re: "[...Who needs OS/2?
There are much better alternatives: Liunx and FreeBSD...]" Who ever told you that the Chinese would have waited for you to tell them about "Linux"... as a of fact they have already tried to develop their own Linux; but, guess what Windows still has 90% world market share; and, it gets even better... (as was mentioned before) just you wait until NASA grounds its Space Shuttle Fleet then come back and tell the world how those NASA Astronauts will get to the International Space Station and back to Earth without those "OS/2" Powered Rocket Launchers controlled by the Russian Federation!

[esysoft]

Steel making problem in the U. S. can be traced to history. When the U. S. entered WW II, it has a very young steel industry. After the war, Japan started re-building its damaged steel factories with the help of the U.S. Then the U.S. steel industry started to lose it competitive advantage because the new factories in Japan cost less to operate. Now China builds it steel factories and Japan and the U.S. are losing. It cost a lot of money to build a new steel factory in order to compete. Add the labor and environmental costs, too, and it even becomes harder. The only way to do it cheap in the U.S. is through automation. But then, it would only take a few years before they catch up...

[wangbang]

You guys are reading what you want to read into this article. They are concentrating on their home market because they are getting their @ss kicked in the international market. It has nothing to do with protecting their market from imports.

[globalist_agenda]

And you know for a fact that Lenovo isn't getting any support from their new owner, the Chinese? Take your head out of the sand man.

http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/us-files-wto-case-against/story.aspx?guid={64508D15-7FE2-4005-B93B-B20084A031E7}

U.S. files WTO case against China's export subsidies Washington says incentives hurt U.S. exporters
By Greg Robb, MarketWatch
Last update: 4:35 p.m. EST Feb. 2, 2007
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) -- China is illegally subsidizing hundreds of billions of dollars of exports to the United States, the Bush administration charged Friday, as it filed a mammoth unfair trade case against Beijing. "We are committed to challenging China's WTO-inconsistent practices that harm American workers and businesses," said U.S. Trade Representative Susan Schwab in a prepared statement.
"China's use of market-distorting subsidies creates an uneven playing field and subverts China's own efforts to foster consumption-led growth," Schwab said. The U.S. is seeking WTO-sponsored talks with China to end the subsidies, including basic tax laws and other tools, which the U.S. says are illegal and provide incentives for foreign investors in China and their Chinese partners to export to the United States.

[Seaspray0]

We used to buy them when they were owned by IBM. The ones I see comming off the assembly line today are not of the same quality. But what should I expect? If China had quality control, they would have never sold tainted milk, toys with lead based paint, tainted dog food ingredients... It seems everything I've bought that was made in china fell apart within the year.

[w_bee]

I have owned four Thinkpads over the years; two made in the IBM years.
I don't see any quality differences then and now. The Thinkpads are very well built, period.

In terms of Mr. Seaspray0's generalization of China's quality control, he's obviously only buy stuffs on the cheap.
There are long list of quality products that are made in China: IPoad, EEE pc, HDTVs, cell phones.......

[Commander_Spock]

Re: "In terms of Mr. Seaspray0's generalization of China's quality control, he's obviously only buy stuffs on the cheap..." What can you accurately tell us about the experiences in third world countries that cannot even afford to feed, clothe and house themselves much less afford to buy the more expensive products!!!

[gggg sssss]

Good riddance to bad rubbish.

[seven7dust]

lol! you took the words right out of my mouth

[Viv Collins]

So long and thanks for all the tech.