Lenovo is planning BIG!

Talk about "WhatEVER !"..
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ryengineer
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Lenovo is planning BIG!

#1 Post by ryengineer » Fri Jul 27, 2007 1:06 pm

Lenovo already has 6 manufacturing centers in Asia, one additional (location: NC) was announced last month, and 2 (location: Mexico and India) more are announced yesterday. With these centers lenovo would expand it's 3000 family line, target more and more retail channels by providing in-store availability and ofcourse continue producing it's best known "Think" division of pc products.

Basically Lenovo has made this move to battle increasingly tough competition with other computer giants like Dell and HP and also to accommodate greater amount of quality services and products to it's loyal and new customers. The other plants will continue to operate but with the creation of Mexican center, customers across Americas will enjoy faster turn around with less or no shipping delays at all.

RESEARCH TRIANGLE PARK, NC, MONTERREY, MEXICO, and NEW DELHI, INDIA - July 26, 2007 – Lenovo today announced the company will open two new, state-of-the-art manufacturing plants and fulfillment operations centers in Monterrey, Mexico, and Baddi, Himachal Pradesh, India. Each of the facilities will support regional customer requirements including product assembly and configuration, distribution services and logistics — and additional value-added services — to meet the need for Lenovo products in these economically vital markets.

The Baddi plant is expected to be operational in the third fiscal quarter of 2007, while the Monterrey facility will come online by mid-2008. The new plants will enable Lenovo to significantly increase global production capacity of Think-branded and Lenovo-branded PCs.

The total combined economic value of these investments is estimated at more than $30 million, including the cost of construction, tooling, salaries, taxes and additional contributions to the local, regional and national economies.

"These plants are an investment in Lenovo's future that leverages our world-class manufacturing base in China and extends it globally to satisfy demand for Lenovo products in vital economic opportunity areas," said Gerry P. Smith, senior vice president of Lenovo's Global Supply Chain. "This announcement, together with the new facilities we recently announced in Shanghai, China, and North Carolina, will help us to improve our competitiveness and cost structure as well as accelerate our ability to reach new markets and buyer segments.

"We are also actively scouting locations in Central and Eastern Europe and anticipate shortly announcing a similar type of installation mirroring what we are reporting today," Smith said.

Lenovo currently has manufacturing facilities in Beijing, Huiyang, Shanghai and Shenzhen, China, and Pondicherry, India, and a new fulfillment center in Whitsett, North Carolina, announced last month.

The planned 260,000 square foot (24,155 square meters) Monterrey facility will have a production capacity of five million PCs when it goes on-stream in mid-2008, employing approximately 750 people. The plant will supply PCs to customers throughout the Americas and represents Lenovo's largest manufacturing investment to date outside of China.

The Baddi plant will be the first to go online, with some limited production capacity available as soon as September 2007 to serve the growing India market. With an annual capacity of two million units, the plant initially will measure 130,000 square feet (12,077 square meters), and employ approximately 350 people.
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#2 Post by bhtooefr » Fri Jul 27, 2007 3:39 pm

Going back to their roots, I see.

(Many early ThinkPads were made in Mexico...)
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#3 Post by spuddog » Fri Jul 27, 2007 6:04 pm

Big is not always better. Up until 8 months ago I worked for Maytag. maybe you've heard of them. They were the best in washing machine quality at a premium price. Sound familiar? New management had the idea that if they could make them cheaper they could sell one to everybody. the manufacturing went overseas, the quality down, now all of the original plants that made the quality that the company was built on are closed, and Maytag has been bought out by Whirlpiss. Sorry if my bitterness shows, but like I said bigger is not always better

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Learning curve

#4 Post by anthean » Fri Jul 27, 2007 6:53 pm

Humans take a while to learn their jobs, become comfortable with the procedures, etc.

From past experience in the quality department of a once-large computer company, I can claim that, as a rule of thumb, the first three months at any new facility where generally chaotic. Maybe Lenovo can do better--I hope so.

But as a cautious person, I would not want one of the machines made at those plants during their first three months to half a year of operation. Again, I'm not knocking Lenovo--this is my concern regarding any rapidly expanding (or changing) company.

And as an aside, if Lenovo really wants to expand, maybe they should buy an LCD maker, so they can force production of the 4/3 screen that so many of us crumudgeons clearly still want.
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#5 Post by bhtooefr » Fri Jul 27, 2007 6:56 pm

Except that doesn't apply here - the sites at which ThinkPads were originally produced have been closed for YEARS.

ThinkPads have bounced through so many production plants... M a t s u s h i t a (IIRC,) IBM Mexico, Winstron, Great Wall, Lenovo... along with Acer (who built the i Series,) Epson (who built the 300, IIRC,) and some other company that I can't recall the name of, but built the G40 and G41.
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#6 Post by ryengineer » Fri Jul 27, 2007 9:53 pm

spuddog wrote:Big is not always better. Up until 8 months ago I worked for Maytag. maybe you've heard of them. They were the best in washing machine quality...........snip
Lenovo is not going to make those mistakes, it has already, successfully, gone through that stage. Having two lines of personal computers (3000 and Think) is a big boost for lenovo; that gives it extra options to work with.

Lenovo's plan is to cut down the cost of 3000 family line and to market it as much as possible and to make it available more and more to small business and individuals. Think line (Thinkpad and ThinkCentre) is bread and butter for lenovo, it's not going to do anything to it, but is not limited to, only if required.
"I've come a long, long way," she said, "and I will go as far,
With the man who takes me from my horse, and leads me to a bar."
The man who took her off her steed, and stood her to a beer,
Were a bleary-eyed Surveyor and a DRUNKEN ENGINEER.

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#7 Post by Techgurl » Fri Jul 27, 2007 10:43 pm

spuddog wrote:Big is not always better. Up until 8 months ago I worked for Maytag. maybe you've heard of them. They were the best in washing machine quality at a premium price. Sound familiar? New management had the idea that if they could make them cheaper they could sell one to everybody. the manufacturing went overseas, the quality down, now all of the original plants that made the quality that the company was built on are closed, and Maytag has been bought out by Whirlpiss. Sorry if my bitterness shows, but like I said bigger is not always better

Scott
Thats a shame Maytag was a real quality product.
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#8 Post by BruisedQuasar » Fri Jul 27, 2007 11:47 pm

I do a lot of business research for investment purposes & I have owned businesses. I observed that too often what happens is a unique leader and crew put together a great product. Eventually, they move on to other challenges and retirement. Most of the new crew are just putting in hours and drawing a check. Hotshot ivy league MBAs take over who just play by the numbers, senior executives move in who are more into their limo and other tax free benefits.

Often senior executives who stay too long, get comfortable, the blood stops circulating to their brains. They get lockbrain and intellectual senility. Kmart executes fell prey to this. Ford and GM top brass have no drive. Also deadly is bureaucracy. Yes, corporations grow bureaucracy just like government does. They get top heavy and asthmatic. Often simple stuff like just mingling with the average worker and line management could have saved a once great firm.

Peter Norton, US Robotics, Michael Dell put together great companies but men less competent, experienced and greatly less qualified take over eventually. After Dell stepped down, the brown nose team took over. Gates discovered this happened to Microsoft, so he fled the scene. The great company gets huge and the mediocre office politics clowns take over.

Now big corporations and their board of directors are as corrupt as our Congress and Senate. Home Depot's one year CEO who took Depot further down, not up was "Bud" to the Board. They gave him an insane 200 million parting goodbye...and we talk of Mexican, Iraqi. now Chinese corruption. The pot is calling the kettle black.
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#9 Post by carbon_unit » Sat Jul 28, 2007 9:45 am

spuddog wrote:Big is not always better. Up until 8 months ago I worked for Maytag. maybe you've heard of them. They were the best in washing machine quality at a premium price. Sound familiar? New management had the idea that if they could make them cheaper they could sell one to everybody. the manufacturing went overseas, the quality down, now all of the original plants that made the quality that the company was built on are closed, and Maytag has been bought out by Whirlpiss. Sorry if my bitterness shows, but like I said bigger is not always better

Scott
I live about an hour south of Newton IA which was the Maytag headquarters. We too felt the repurcussions when Maytag closed.
Here we had the headquarters for Hy-Vee food stores which is in Iowa and the surrounding states. About 12 years ago they got big and moved the good paying jobs to Des Moines. The Warehouse is still here but that is all low paying jobs. It about dried this town up. Taxes went through the roof trying to just maintain the city and schools. Hy-Vee went from the family type business where the president and CEO knew everyone by name to a cold, bitter, cut-throat, all for profit type of organization. Good for profits, bad for people.
Bigger is not always better for everyone.

Sorry about the thread hijack.
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#10 Post by ryengineer » Sun Jul 29, 2007 10:54 pm

More to story:
Lenovo: more competition for Dell
Posted Jul 27th 2007 8:30AM by Douglas McIntyre
Filed under: International markets, Products and services, Industry, Competitive strategy, Dell (DELL), Hewlett-Packard (HPQ), India, China

Chinese PC-maker Lenovo, which owns the former IBM (NYSE: IBM) PC operations, will open plants (subscription required) in India to supply that market and in Mexico to supply the US. Lenovo has the largest market share of the PC market in China but has put less emphasis on other emerging markets and North America.

That may be changing as the company takes on Dell (NASDAQ: DELL) and HP (NYSE: HPQ) in India and the US.

HP is less vulnerable. It has large printer, services, and server businesses and its global PC market share puts it in the No.1 spot.

Dell is less fortunate. Recent IDC and Gartner data show the company losing global share. Lenovo's CEO and supply chief are both former Dell executives.

Dell hardly needs the competition. In the midst of a turnaround now that founder Michael Dell has returned at CEO, the company has to bank on not having a sharp drop in revenue as customers move purchases to other PC-makers.

That turnaround just got a bit more difficult.

Douglas A. McIntyre is a partner at 24/7 Wall St.
"I've come a long, long way," she said, "and I will go as far,
With the man who takes me from my horse, and leads me to a bar."
The man who took her off her steed, and stood her to a beer,
Were a bleary-eyed Surveyor and a DRUNKEN ENGINEER.

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#11 Post by mattbiernat » Sun Jul 29, 2007 11:03 pm

the poor quality of dells has somewhat become legendary.

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