Talk with Lenovo President and Chief Operating Officer Rory Read about business and you’re likely to see him assume a ‘Rocky’-style boxing pose, fists raised. The stance is shorthand for Lenovo’s “protect and attack” philosophy. The protect part means the PC maker plans to defend its traditional strengths, such as its China business and corporate computer Thinkpad brand. The attack part stands for the new opportunities Lenovo aims to pursue, including emerging geographical markets and mobile devices.
Leading Lenovo’s attack: the company’s first tablet computers, dubbed LePad. The first LePad, a 10-inch device that runs on Google’s Android operating system, went on sale in China in March. A slightly updated LePad will hit the U.S. market in June. Though the category is still young, Read expects tablets to capture 15 to 18% of the PC market in about five years.
Read compares the momentum behind tablets to the popularity that netbooks enjoyed at their peak. “Netbooks are on the wane,” said Read in an interview. “You see them blurring back into the notebook [category].”
Lenovo has high expectations for the LePad, particularly because the June launch will enable the tablet to ship with a version of Android specifically built for tablets’ larger screens. Lenovo, in fact, waited for that Android build, known as 3.0 or Honeycomb, to release LePad. Read, who has publicly commented on Android’s mismatch with tablets prior to Honeycomb, stands by his earlier statements.
“Android evolved from a 3.5-inch phone screen,” Read explained. Companies that applied earlier versions of Android to tablets, did so “before the right time” and were forced to “stretch” the operating system to fit the bigger displays, he contends.
The emergence of Honeycomb, which Google is currently distributing to device manufacturers, marks a transition for Android. This summer, when the LePad becomes available, the “Android environment will be ready for tablets,” said Read.
The LePad global launch has been a lengthy process. Lenovo first showed LePad at the January 2010 Consumer Electronics Show (CES). Read said the company is committed to “[not introducing] products before their time.”
Lenovo appears to be applying that same logic to its smartphone business. Though the company sells a popular, Android-based handset in China called the LePhone, Read said Lenovo has no immediate plans to enter the U.S. smartphone market. The company’s preference is to debut new products in China and the rest of Asia, followed by emerging markets. Mature markets like the U.S. come last because they are crowded with strong competitors and cost more in terms of advertising and marketing, he added.
Lenovo’s patience extends to experimental product categories like smartbooks. An early proponent of these lightweight, “always-on” computing devices, the company exhibited one of the first smartbooks at CES in January 2010. The device never made it to store shelves, but Read said similar gadgets may come to market in the future. “An Android tablet could be made in clamshell form,” said Read. Such a device would essentially be a smartbook, he noted, because it would share the same basic characteristics.
Other PC rivals, such as Acer, have been rocked by management changes in recent weeks. Read said Lenovo should be able to avoid upheaval by sticking to its “protect and attack” plan. “We have no disagreement on strategy and what we want to do to win,” he said.
To play up its mobile device business, Lenovo is preparing a global marketing campaign under its new Chief Marketing Officer, David Roman, who was recruited from HP last year. The campaign will position Lenovo devices as productivity machines by emphasizing the way they fit “those who do” – meaning, people who are effective and decisive, said Read. The campaign will kick off later this year.
Source: Forbes
