Gadget manufacturers

Today, Lenovo is one of China's leading manufacturers of diverse computing devices and a true technology innovator. The number of fans of her products is growing every year thanks to the democratic pricing policy of the brand.

Lenovo was founded in Beijing in 1984, and it was then called Lianxiang (in English, Legend, that is, "Legend"). This name remained with her for the first twenty years.

The company was founded by a group of ten engineers, and it was created with funds from the Chinese Academy of Sciences. On the day of the creation of Lianxiang were also approved by the Chinese government.

The most famous founder of the company is Liu Chuanzhi. An interesting fact: after graduating from high school, he dreamed of being a military pilot and even passed all the necessary exams, but was declared unfit for military service due to the fact that his relative was convicted as a representative of the right forces.

In the same year, Liu entered the Institute of Telecommunications Engineering, but against the backdrop of political and class background, again, he was only allowed to study radar. Be that as it may, it was studying at the institute that gave the future founder of a large company an idea of ​​\u200b\u200bcomputer technology.

In 1966, Liu told his fellow students that the Cultural Revolution was a terrible idea, resulting in him being exiled to a rice farm near Macau. After some time, he was exiled from there to the Hunan farm, where he was also involved in corrective labor - like many young people of those years.

Some time will pass, and Liu Chuanzhi will return to Beijing, in order to end up in his place. In 1970, he took a position as an administrative engineer at an institute where he worked on computer development. In 1984, Liu resigned and got a job in the personnel department of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.

It was there that he met the future founders of Lenovo. By the way, Chuanzhi called Hewlett-Packard Corporation his key source of inspiration. In one of his interviews, he once said that it was she who was his "earliest and best teacher."

Later, Lenovo will acquire the rights to the IBM personal computer.

Liu will even remember:

“I remember the first time I attended an IBM agent meeting. I was wearing my father's old business suit and I was sitting in the back row. Even in my dreams, I never could have imagined that we could buy the IBM business. It was unthinkable. Impossible".

Another founder of Lianxiang, Jia Xu Fu, announced that the first meeting in preparation for the establishment of the company was held on October 17, 1984.

The firm's eleven founders were all middle-aged and members of the Institute of Computer Technology of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The starting capital was 200,000 yuan. By the way, the academy also took up financing of the created enterprise.

The first significant efforts of the company were aimed at importing TV sets. Unfortunately, this venture was not very successful. The company had to recover for a whole year.

At the same time, its specialists began to check the quality of computers for new customers. The company soon began designing a circuit board that would allow IBM-compatible personal computers to process and recognize Chinese characters.

Needless to say, the topic was more than relevant. This work was the first major success of the company. By the way, at about the same time, Liu Chuanzhi tried to sell digital watches, but the idea turned out to be a failure.

Liu himself said it like this:

“Our team often chose the commercial path they were going to take. This led to a lot of arguments, especially between the chief engineer and me. He felt that if the product was of the right quality, it would sell itself. But I knew that was not true, because marketing and other factors were also an integral part of the eventual success.

Of course, the first difficulties were exacerbated by the fact that the company had little experience in doing business.

Chuanzhi told:

“We were mostly scientists and didn't understand the market. We only learned by trial and error, which was very interesting, but also dangerous.”

In May 1988, the company placed its first job advertisement on the front page of China Youth News. Such announcements were a real rarity in China at the time. It is all the more surprising that 500 respondents responded to it.

Of these, 280 were selected for the written examination and 120 were interviewed orally. As a result, 58 people received job offers (although it was originally planned to hire no more than 16).

The new staff now included 18 people with credentialed degrees, 37 bachelors and 3 students without a university degree. Their average age was 26 years. Among these new employees was Yang Yanging, the future head of Lenovo.

The 88th year was also marked by the fact that Liu Chuanzhi received government permission to open a branch in Hong Kong, where he moved with five other employees. Liu's father was also in Hong Kong, and he actively helped him, mentoring him and providing financial support.

In order to save money, Chuanzhi and his colleagues did not even take public transport, preferring to walk. True, in order to comply with the rules, they had to rent rooms in hotels for meetings.

In 1990, the company began production and sales under its own brand.

In 2002, Yang Yanging, who then headed it, decided to drop the former name Legend due to the fact that it had already been used repeatedly by other enterprises around the world, and there were plans to expand outside of China.

In the spring of 2003, the company publicly announced that it would now be known as Lenovo. This name was composed of the beginning of the previous name of the company ("Le" from Legend) and the Latin word "novo", which means "new".

The firm spent 18 million yuan on an eight-week television advertising campaign. The Lenovo logo appeared against a blue sky, and viewers saw the inscription: "Transcendence depends on how you think."

By the end of 2003, the company spent a total of 200 million yuan on rebranding.

In the 1990s, Lenovo decided to go public to raise capital. Unfortunately, they still had a very poor understanding of the rules and the responsibility that would fall on their shoulders in connection with a public campaign.

At the same time, Liu Chuanzhi had to learn about the importance of choosing words carefully. During the first trip to Europe to discuss the results of the company, he reacted very painfully to the skeptical questions that he was asked.

So, the times of Legend have taught Chuanzhi all the things that start a truly international company.

One of Lenovo's most important products was the Tianxi computer, specifically designed to make Internet access easier for inexperienced Chinese users. So, he had a separate button to connect to the Internet and open a web browser.

In 2000, this computer became the best-selling computer in Chinese history. Over a million units have been sold this year alone.

This was followed by a series of mergers and acquisitions that played a major role in the history of the company. In 2005, Lenovo acquired the IBM personal computer business, including tablet lines and the ThinkPad line of laptops. This acquisition accelerated access to foreign markets while improving technology.

This is what made Lenovo the third largest computer manufacturer in the world.

Liu Chuanzhi said it like this:

“From the acquisition of IBM, we immediately benefited in three ways. We have acquired the ThinkPad brand, more advanced computer technology, and the company's international resources in the form of global sales channels and operational teams. These three elements have boosted our revenue over the past few years.”

For several years now, Lenovo has been widely known to all lovers of Chinese mobile devices. But few people know that in 2008 it sold the division for the production of smartphones and tablets for $100 million.

This was done in order to focus entirely on the production of personal computers. True, in the fall of 2009, the mobile division was bought back for $200 million. In the same year, it ranked third in China in terms of its market share.

The company has also invested heavily in a fund dedicated to providing seed funding to develop mobile apps for the LeGarden online store. In 2010, the store already had over a thousand programs for LePhone.

The company entered the smartphone market in 2012 and quickly became the largest supplier in China. Lenovo's desire to increase its share of the Chinese market, along with the popularity of devices, prompted a change in its approach to the design and manufacture of "smart" mobile devices.

In 2012, Lenovo becomes the No. 2 smartphone supplier in China. True, it is worth noting that at that time about 100 different brands of smartphones were sold in this country, and therefore the second place could be equated to a market share of just over 10%.

In the same year, the company invested over $750 million in mobile device manufacturing and an R&D facility in Wuhan, China. (R&D stands for "research and development" - "research and development".)

The year before, in 2011, Lenovo entered into a joint venture with , which was engaged in the production of personal computers.

It was intended to boost the company's computer sales around the world, as well as expanding its presence in the Japanese market, a key PC market.

This was a very important step, since as of 2010 NEC controlled about 20% of the Japanese computer market. Lenovo accounted for 5% of the number of shares.

Both companies have agreed to cooperate in other areas, including the development of servers and tablets. By 2014, Lenovo will also acquire NEC's portfolio of mobile technology patents. This purchase will include core patents for LTE and 3G.

2011 was also marked by the fact that Lenovo announced its plans to acquire control over the German electronics firm Medion.

This would double Lenovo's share of the German computer market and make it the third largest computer supplier in terms of sales (after Hewlett-Packard Corporation).

The deal was closed in the third quarter of that year, but Medion's chairman agreed to sell two-thirds of his stake (which was 60%). This was the first such case in which a Chinese company was going to acquire a well-known German firm.

The following year was marked by other successful acquisitions. In September, Lenovo decided to boost regional growth and turned to a local partner.

Specifically, they agreed to acquire Digibris, an electronics firm based in Brazil that sells products under the CCE brand name. Brazil will host the 2016 Summer Olympics, and Lenovo plans to take advantage of the increase in CCE sales.

Following the purchase of Digibris, the company announced that it now intends to focus on software and IT services.

In September, Lenovo decided to acquire US software company Stoneware. However, no financial details were disclosed.

Lenovo itself then stated that Stoneware would not have a significant impact on increasing revenues, and its acquisition is necessary mainly in order to improve cloud services.

At the same time, sales of software by Stoneware themselves, together with Lenovo, doubled.

In January 2014, Google announced that they were going to sell Motorola Mobility to Lenovo.

The deal included some smartphone lines (eg DROID Ultra, Moto G and Moto X). The company also received a draft of the future Motorola Mobility roadmap.

Yang Yinging said at the time that "acquiring such an iconic brand, innovative product portfolio, and incredibly talented global team will immediately make Lenovo a strong competitor in the smartphone market." He also said that "Google is very good in software, ecosystems and services, but we are stronger in the production of devices."

One of the leaders of Lenovo then told the following::

“There are many reasons why we bought Motorola, but it was primarily because it has a history in the UK. In addition, Motorola has long established relationships and routes to the North American and UK markets where people are tied to their network carrier.”

In the summer of 2014, Lenovo received approval for the acquisition of Motorola by the European Union. The Commission then concluded that this purchase would not create a competition problem in the sales of smart devices (smartphones and tablets), given the presence of other suppliers on the market.

The acquisition was completed in October 2014. Motorola Mobility remained headquartered in Chicago and continued to use its own brand, but Liu Jun, president of Lenovo's mobile business, became chairman of the company.

Today, Lenovo designs and manufactures personal computers, tablets, smartphones, servers and electronic storage devices, as well as smart TVs and software.

In October 2014, Lenovo was also confirmed to be developing "Smartbrand" wearable devices with an optical heart rate monitor. The battery of such a device holds 7 days.

The device can be used to track distance and time, calories burned, and so on. With it, the user will also be able to unlock the computer without a password.

The device went on sale on the Lenovo website without an official product announcement.

Lenovo's corporate culture is very different from most large Chinese companies. Although Lenovo was founded with money from the state-owned Chinese Academy of Sciences, today they operate as a private enterprise without government intervention.

The official language of the company is English. Ian Yanging, who remains CEO, does not understand him very well, but is engaged in improving language skills and mastering American culture (for which he even moved with his family to Morrisville).

Younging's efforts were also appreciated because foreigners can work for him in a friendly atmosphere and excellent conditions.

When Yang took over Lenovo's computer department, he insisted on refusing to use official titles and titles, as well as to stop referring to each other by their first names.

The company's managers had to stand outside the offices each morning and greet their workers by holding signs with their names. When Younging's department moved to a new building in 1997, he also insisted on a more formal dress code and telephone etiquette training.

Yang wanted his colleagues to think and act like workers in high-tech factories in developed markets. Obviously, this also paid off.

Today, Lenovo has offices in more than sixty countries and sells its products in 160 countries.

Manufacturer Lenovo

Lenovo Group Limited is a Chinese computer company registered in Hong Kong and ranked fourth in the world in PC manufacturing. This information about the company's success is based on the results of 2007. HP, Dell, Acer are ahead of the company in this indicator. The company's head office is located in Purchase, New York, USA.

The company specializes in the development and production of PCs, PDAs, the company owns the development of servers, video projectors and monitors. Lenovo's main shareholders are Legend Holdings Ltd, which has a 42 percent stake and operates under the control of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, as well as the American company IBM, which holds about 9 percent of the shares, and American investment funds are also shareholders. The company employs about 20 thousand people. human.

*manufacturer's country refers to the country in which the brand was founded and is headquartered

The last decade in the global industry of personal computers and other high-tech devices is characterized by a very rapid change of leaders. Firms unknown yesterday already occupy a significant share of the market today. One of these new leaders in the production of computers and laptops, as well as mobile devices is Lenovo. But what kind of company is this, what country, and why did it capture the market so quickly.

Which country this company belongs to, the question is no longer relevant - any schoolchild knows that Chinese manufacturers have been victoriously marching around the world for a long time. Nevertheless, let's see what kind of Lenovo it is and how seriously you need to take its current successes.

In our country, the word Lenovo has become known quite recently. However, it turns out that this name hides a manufacturer with an already significant history that began back in 1984. Then it was founded by several Chinese scientists who, with the support of their Academy of Sciences (China), were engaged in importing and adapting computer equipment to the requirements of the Chinese user.

Name

The name Lenovo did not appear immediately, initially the company was called quite in the spirit of its time New Technology Developer Incorporated. But two years later it changed its name to Legend, and after another 7 years, when the company was preparing to enter the international market, it received the name Lenovo known to the whole world today. It is believed that this name was made up of the first two letters of the former brand name le and the word novo, meaning new.

Field of activity

The beginning of a breakthrough in the production of computers is due to the fact that back in 1994 (according to Wikipedia), the company bought out the division for the production of personal computers from IBM itself. But Lenovo only got the right to put its logo on manufactured computers in 2010, before that all computers were produced under the IBM brand. Collaboration with the legendary brand turned out to be profitable also because both manufacturers (IBM and Lenovo) used their resources and sales channels to mutual benefit.

The next step towards conquering the high-tech market was the creation at the beginning of the second decade of this century of a joint venture with the Japanese corporation NEC, the largest manufacturer of electronics and computers in this island nation.

Another major deal was the acquisition of Motorola Mobility in 2014. This is directly related to the company's decision to develop the mobile device segment. Today it is already impossible to imagine a mobile phone and tablet store without Lenovo products on the shelves.

Geography

The current Lenovo is a truly international company. Its research units are located in China, the USA, and Japan. The company's production facilities are located in India, Mexico, USA, Europe. According to the company's website, more than 60,000 employees worldwide are employed today, and it sells its products in more than 160 countries. The efforts of the company's management were not in vain - for the past few years, Lenovo has been ranked first in the world in sales of PCs and laptops.

In addition, Lenovo pays great attention to its image as a socially responsible company dealing with environmental issues and harmonization of relations in its team. The latter served to ensure that the company began to be recognized as one of the most attractive employers in the world. Thus, today Lenovo has established itself as a world leader in the production of personal computers and mobile devices.