Report: Lenovo doing poorly in western markets

[K. Eng]

http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=35557

The latest sales figures show that Lenovo is being ignored by buyers in the west and its profits are being propped up by its great performance on the Chinese market.

It seems to have mostly turned around IBM's loss-making division, but that is mainly by flogging its laptops in Beijing's streets.

Meanwhile, it is getting a good kicking from the likes of Dell and HP in Western markets, particularly the US.

Dell and HP are doing a lot to bring their products up to par with the ThinkPad. Lenovo is going to have to innovate at a faster pace to make their products worth the price premium.

Bean counter JP Morgan sees the market share loss is primarily due to lack of exposure in the fast-growing consumer market, while its core market segment of corporate market has remained stagnant. If Lenovo wants to go Western, it seems they will have to pull finger out and do some heavy marketing.

And get some better notebook designs. Almost everyone I know who is familiar with Lenovo branded notebooks like the N100, considers them clunky and unfashionable.

[snessiram]

I don't know concerning bussiness market, but I'll give you my experience with consumer laptops.

Before I attended highschool this year, I went looking for a laptop. I went to A LOT of stores mainly in Brussels (Belgium). I didn't see a single lenovo. They all seem obsessed by the crap called packard bell and acer. There also are a lot of hp, toshiba and sony (and apple). I had, although never used before, a preference for thinkpads, but just went comparing the available models in the stores. The sony FE21B seemed ok and it felt quite strong. It dissapeared from the store I was going to buy it from and although it was still available at sony center (with only 1 year garantie), I went looking for something else. I decided to drop by 2 small computer stores in the neigbourhood where I got the offer for a R60 at 1400 euro. I quickly ordered one and was happy to notice I had the last one in stock.

I'm now studying informatics at highschool and I thought there would be a lot of ibm/lenovo-fans, but no, even there everyone seems to be obsessed by mainly acer and dell. When I had my thinkpad with me for the first time someone even thought it would be a PII or something .

Make a long story short: finding a lenovo (in Belgium) without explicite looking for it is impossible.

About dell >< lenovo:
I've a friend that has a new d420, similar specs as me. I must say it looks better buildt then other dells I've seen. The dell even has a trackpoint, which I didn't test, but it seemed less handy and there's no middle mouse (which I really like). On the dell site there's advertised 6 hours on battery (6-cell), my friend gets 3. (compared with mine: specs say 3 hours, I get 3h40 using my custom made power sheme)
The D420 also has a widescreen and although I wanted one first too (the sony had one), I'm really SO glad I have just a 4:3. Mainly because the amount of pixels is a lot higher.
The d420 also misses things like active harddrive protection, fingerprint reader (however optional if I'm right), decent software (like thinkvantage),....

To conclude: I think dells are taking over some ibm/lenovo things and are getting better, but it is not (yet) as good as a thinkpad.

About lenovo design:
I thought of a lenovo branded laptop myself for a moment but when I saw pictures of it I found it looking like hp/acer.
It for example is rounded at the back, while I just want to things be sharp-edged.

[pianowizard]

I've a friend that has a new d420, similar specs as me.........The D420 also has a widescreen and although I wanted one first too (the sony had one), I'm really SO glad I have just a 4:3. Mainly because the amount of pixels is a lot higher.

The Dell Latitude D420 is a 3.0-pound ultraportable whereas you R60 is a much bigger "mainstream" notebook, so I am not sure it's fair to compare the two. Your R60 display has more pixels not because it's 4:3 but because it's bigger than the D420's screen. Widescreen displays always have more pixels than their 4:3 counterparts. Your R60 has SXGA+ (1400x1050), right? The widescreen version would be WSXGA+ with 1680x1050 pixels, e.g. some of the Z60m and Z61m models.

[pianowizard]

Dell and HP are doing a lot to bring their products up to par with the ThinkPad. Lenovo is going to have to innovate at a faster pace to make their products worth the price premium.

Going widescreen is an important step.

[christopher_wolf]

Going widescreen is an important step.

As long as they still make 4:3 for most of the sane users, I have no problem with that.

[pianowizard]

As long as they still make 4:3 for most of the sane users, I have no problem with that.

Indeed, for some people, revolutionary technical innovations take a long time to get used to.

[christopher_wolf]

[
Indeed, for some people, revolutionary technical innovations take a long time to get used to.

Yeah, it really does take time until one understands the inherent superiority of 4:3. Most people should adjust fine after awhile though.

[snessiram]

The Dell Latitude D420 is a 3.0-pound ultraportable whereas you R60 is a much bigger "mainstream" notebook, so I am not sure it's fair to compare the two. Your R60 display has more pixels not because it's 4:3 but because it's bigger than the D420's screen. Widescreen displays always have more pixels than their 4:3 counterparts. Your R60 has SXGA+ (1400x1050), right? The widescreen version would be WSXGA+ with 1680x1050 pixels, e.g. some of the Z60m and Z61m models.

I mistaked, he has an d620, nevertheless its still an ultraportable.
I agree with you it's unfair to compare them however I'm looking at it in a general sence.
As you might know, most of the acers/hps/dells (including my friends) have just wxga, so even compared with a 14" or smaller 4:3 screen with SXGA+, it has less pixels. (and that was it in my case)

Now, if you take there's a maximum amount of pixels/inch (lets take 100 to make it easy). For a 5" screen, in 4:3 you would get: 4*100 * 3 * 100 = 120000, for a 16:9 screen, you would get: 2,45... * 100 * 4,3578... * 100 = 106825 (no it's not 100% correct).
As you see, that makes a 4:3 have more pixels for the same diagonal.

And the point is? (theoretically) there is no screen format having more pixels then another, because as it's possible to state that a widescreen has extra pixels in the width, you can also reverse it and say a 4:3 has more pixels in the height.
It's just user preference.
I personally like a 4:3 screen on a laptop because the screen isn't that big and when using widescreen it gets even less high (and yes, also a little wider).
On the other side I would love an external widescreen with the height of a 17" at least, but the "extra space" at the left (and offcourse a really high resolution).

[rleo25]

Well It seems to me you're a little off topic.

On a second thought... with so a huge market as Asia, plus loyal corporate people whose replacement cycle is about to happen next year or probably in 2008 and College's students arround the world (see how many universities have Thinkpad programs) what to worry about? Dont' misunderstand market forces, Thinkpad is a high class oriented product and entering it into a prices war, or gadget adding strategies, won't function... T

Lenovo's developing staff must be aware of all of this and surely they are.

[tomh009]

About dell >< lenovo:
I've a friend that has a new (d620), similar specs as me. I must say it looks better buildt then other dells I've seen.

We have a fair number of D620s at our company. It still takes only about six months for the hinges to become loose (just like the C400, C600, D400 and D600) -- the traditional Dell quality of construction is still there!

[tomh009]

http://www.theinquirer.net/default.aspx?article=35557

The latest sales figures show that Lenovo is being ignored by buyers in the west and its profits are being propped up by its great performance on the Chinese market.

It seems to have mostly turned around IBM's loss-making division, but that is mainly by flogging its laptops in Beijing's streets.

Actually, if you read the original Washington Post article rather than just The Inquirer's interpretation of it, you will see that Lenovo's strength is in Asia rather than just China itself -- 21% market share in Japan, for example.

A further J.P. Morgan quote from the Washington Post article: "We believe the market share loss is primarily due to lack of exposure in the fast-growing consumer market, while its core market segment of corporate market has remained stagnant."

Read: The ThinkPad business is good (but business market has not been growing) while Lenovo is not strong in the consumer market (which is growing strongly).

[rleo25]

That's right Tomh009, couldn't say it better. The outcome of this analysis is that while Lenovo maintain its leadership in Asia, and in the world bussiness markets, and be certain they surely will... we the users, will get excellent and new Thinkpad models in the future, and will keep receiving support to the actual ones. The brand is far from being downhill and Lenovo has passed this difficult world market entrance phase.