联想的全球智能手机霸主野心

choi

Eric Pfanner, 联想的全球智能手机霸主野心. 纽约时报中文网, Dec 31, 2013
cn.tmagazine.com/technology/20131231/t31lenovo/

, which is translated from

Eric Pfanner, King of PCs, Lenovo Sets Smartphone Ambitions. New York Times, Dec 28, 2013.

Lenovo "is already the second-largest smartphone brand in China, after Samsung Electronics. * * * By the third quarter of this year, the company secured 13 percent of the Chinese smartphone market. Samsung Electronics, which had been at it longer, is doing better with 21 percent, according to Canalys, a research firm. But it is enough that worldwide, Lenovo is in third place after Samsung and Apple. By this summer, Lenovo was selling more smartphones and tablets, combined, than its PCs, even though PCs still account for 85 percent of its revenue.

"In 2008, its chief executive at the time, William J Amelio, sold the company’s fledgling mobile business to an investor group for about $100 million. He was seeking to focus the company’s efforts on PCs as it wrestled with the effects of the global financial crisis. The decision proved to be shortsighted. A year earlier, Apple had introduced the iPhone, setting the stage for the mobile Internet revolution. In 2009, Lenovo corrected the error by ousting Mr Amelio. The new chief executive, Yang Yuanqing, bought back the mobile unit — at twice the price — and went to work regaining ground.

"more than 90 percent of the company’s mobile phone sales are still in China

"While Apple and Samsung are ranked among the world’s 10 most valuable brands by Interbrand, a marketing firm, Lenovo is not among the top 100.

My comment: My sense is that Lenovo's global sales rankings, be it PC or smartphone, are based on its sales volume in China (probably at a lower prices than those in developed nations), without which Lenovo may be nothing.