So, how is Lenovo/ Thinkpad doing in business?

By the looks of it, they seem to be turning in a relatively good result. See here.

 

Hopefully they dont end up like palm and blackberry did in the phone arena. They were the top dogs and didnt evolve because they didnt think they had to and now look at them. BB may bounce back, but alot of their users are fleeing. Honestly I was an IBM fan for a looong time and I LOVE my t400, but some of the things they are doing is taking away from the thinkpad way. Maybe Im way off here, but I just get the same feeling about thinkpads as I do about palm. Just my $.02

 

hum i am not surprised how strongly Lenovo is doing in China, since it is a home grown company and most of the government and SOE uses their machines.

It is an interesting note to see that Lenovo is growing in USA and in other EM, which is a more important indicator of Lenovo marketing and sales strategy.

Lenovo sales this second quarter should be even stronger, since new models are coming up.

 

Is there any way to tell how well the ThinkPad line doing in terms of sales vs the competition?

 

lenovo don't release this sort of specific information due to fear of competitors using these information against them.

 

You know Lenovo could reverse the trend of killing 16:10...or even bring back 4:3 screens...might boost sales quite a bit.

 

Not unless Dell and HP decided to go back to 16:10 or 4:3 format.

 

I was kinda wondering the same thing, especially after reading the review of the IdeaPad V460 here.

 

Ha just wishful thinking. If Dell kept 16:10, I would have stuck with them but the new Latitude design is an eyesore.

 

You can still purchase the current Latitude notebooks! E6410 1440x900 looks really nice (and is well-built too).

 

Check out the thinkpad w7XX and precision m6XXX series. They still use the "old" and superior 16:10 ratio still and for that I applaud them for it.

 

M6600 is going from 17" to 17.3" so it means 16:9 screens.

The thing about the E series, though I do like them, they don't feel as durable as the older D series. I love my D620.

 

I think Lenovo should open up more with the direct selling, some countries you have to buy through a "partner" which often is a IT company who probably won't sell you one computer!

I would increase spending on the marketing for ThinkPads and sell them more directly! And move more to a retail selling strategy for the IdeaPad and the other Lenovo laptops.

No secret ThinkPad's are for business! But there is still some of us who would prefer it over any other consumer brand!

 

Thinkpad T series is the competitor of the Dell series. E series of the Thinkpad is more of a recent addition to swell the rank of Thinkpads and profit from the Thinkpad brand.

 

Their ads/marketing campaigns are non existent in Canada though. Granted, it's a tiny market compared with the one in the States but still there are plenty of corporations present as well.

 

I have noticed alot of lenovo ads lately, yet still no real representation in the retail market.

Well that sucks. I guess I was done with the 17in WUXGA segment anyways. I will admit that dell has gone down hill like the others in quality, but they just havent fallen as hard as most. I primarily work with the vostro line but have been thinking about trying out a precision for a while. I guess now Ill look at the 11-14in latitude market even though Im probably a few years out from buying a new computer.

If only lenovo still offered a wxga+ screen in a 12in still...

 

What's wrong with Dell's quality. Build quality vs overall quality is something else. The Vostro 1700 you have is a rebranded Inspiron 1720, the last good consumer notebook from Dell.

The Precisions aren't bad, but you could take a look at an M6400/M6500, they are still 16:10. The M6600 is going 16:9 but there are rumors that IPS screens are coming back to Dells, and it is the HP Elitebook screen.

But given the way Latitudes have gone, I might jump ship to Lenovo..

 

While I don't know how good ThinkPad sales currently are, I know two ways Lenovo could easily improve them.

One would involve improving their shipping and logistics, say, adding a North American assembly plant that would have on hand ThinkPad chassis shipped from main production in China. The plant in NA would do the customization (e.g., RAM, CPU, etc.) and ship out orders for Canada, the US, and Mexico, drastically reducing ship-times. I'd probably recommend something similar for Europe as well, but I'm not as familiar with how that sort of thing might work in the EU.

The second thing they could do would be to streamline and improve depot support. We've seen how legendary the stories have been here about repair, and to improve that would bring a substantial boost to Lenovo's reputation. One possibility might be to make onsite repair standard for the ThinkPad line, even if it cost a little more, and keep it as an upgrade-option for the IdeaPad line. A middle-ground option would be to make onsite standard for the W, T, and X-Series lines only.

I think a lot of Lenovo's issues stem from inconsistency, and to me, inconsistency is a sign that there's a breakdown in efficiency somewhere in the system that could use a remedy. If they could fix those issues, I think they could gain a fair amount of additional market-share in North America, and use that position to improve further globally.

P.S. I've experienced a lot more consistency with Dell, at least in their business lines. While they aren't perfect either, the above two things I talked about are things that I've seen Dell do a lot better than Lenovo over the past several years. And Tsunade --I'd say the D630 is probably the best laptop ever to come from Dell, but the E64xx-65xx isn't bad, either.

 

Since Dell/HP's portfolios are much more diversified than Lenovo's I wonder how their financials compare. 100 million net income is nothing to sneeze at, but over 5.9 billion of revenue, the margins seem pretty slim.

 

I absolutely agree with the suggestion of a plant in North America! That could then be used for sales in the South American market. As at the moment, it's very difficult to order a Lenovo ThinkPad other than direct!

Dell has the key in this, a worldwide network and anyone, anywhere can buy the computer direct and have it shipped in no time. HP moved into this and I am sure it improved their sales.

 

I cant buy Dell direct in my country, only dealers.
Same for Lenovo.

 

I don't see any mention of Lenovo's tie-up with NEC. In business terms, quite a big deal:

Lenovo Newsroom | LENOVO AND NEC FORM JOINT VENTURE TO CREATE JAPAN?s LARGEST PC GROUP

Also, I read this in the FT the other day:

FT.com / Technology - Revamped Lenovo takes battle back to Acer

Looks encouraging for Lenovo.

 

Didn't IBM used to assemble the systems in Mexico?

 

Some were. The 600 series were assembled in Guadalajara.

 

Everybody is moving their plant out of the US, maybe they should setup one in Mexico or one of the poorer but more stable country in South America.

 

Unless US sets up some sort of chicken tax against Chinese exports, then there is no real chance of setting up plants in south America to serve NA market. For one china has already got the most diversified supply chain setup for producing consumer electronics. If Taiwanese contract manufacturer moves to south America it would take at least 10 years to build up the capacity.

 

Yeah the 1720 was the silver 1700 and also cost alot more then the vostro for the same options. I originally wanted the inspiron version as I liked silver more at the time, but I just got so much more with the vostro. Ill also agree the consumer division sub XPS has been pretty poor since the original penryn systems shipped. But XPS up and their business models are still built pretty well. We have a vsotro 3700 and xps 15 at the office that I support and they are both pretty sturdy. Granted not as high of a weapon class as my 1700, but still pretty good.

I always loved the precision systems but never had the money for a decent system. If they were keeping 16:10 I would make my next at home setup a 17in, but since 16:9 is pretty much at 100% of systems Ill stick to the 15.6/16in system size for home. As for my mobile rig if lenovo made a wxga+ or 1600x900 ULV 12in x series or dell does the same Im still undecided. Maybe a 1080p quad core 13 or 14in would do they trick.

 

Well I was looking at the Inspiron 1520 when I was looking for a notebook for college. I had beta-tested Vista, and I still had the bitter taste in my mouth and Dell wanted 100 bucks for XP Professional over Vista, so I browsed the business section, and the Vostro 1500 had XP Pro and the base price was like 429 back then. So I upgraded up to ~900 bucks which was my budget from my parents. I also looked at the XPS...and quickly realized it was way out of my budget.

Precisions were nice but the price of stripped down base Precision, I got a loaded Vostro 1500. Mobile workstations are the kind of notebooks where you get all the bells and whistles cause you already spending 1500-2500 bucks already.

Unfortunately people screamed for cheaper laptops, so 4:3 died in a heartbeat, then 16:10 starting disappearing...why can't we go backwards in time? Le sigh..

 

I agree. While I do miss 4:3, 16:10 was by far my favorite screen ratio. I remember my 1700 costing 1500ish while a similar 1720 would have cost me well over 2k. Im sorry but 2k+ for an inspiron...no thanks. Even though it was one of the best if not the best inspirons they ever put out. I just wish the 16:10 didnt die out so darn fast because of cheapness and the ignorant masses believing its better. The only good thing about 16:9 that I can say is that they are offering higher res screens in smaller laptops. The z series idea makes me drool...1080p in a 13.1in laptop????YES PLEASE!

 

I just bought one of these used on Craigslist for a colleague. Very solid unit. Core 2 T6670, 3 gigs of RAM, 250 gig 7200rpm drive, N-wireless. At the $300 price-point for a used system, it's a decent box.

The only detractor is Dell not giving driver support for the Media bar above the keyboard in Windows 7, despite the "Windows 7" sticker right on the laptop. Dell ControlPoint software isn't compatible, even though it is for the very similar Latitude E5500. It's a rare falling-down in Dell's recent history.

 

I wouldn't say everyone. Look at Hyundai's new Alabama car plant They're doing quite well selling Sonatas made there at this point.

 

Profit margin on general consumer laptops for laptop brand company is about 5% and another 5% for the contract manufacturer. Unless the laptop that these company market and produces are worth over 2000 dollars (with high margin, i.e. like Alienware M17x), then there is little likelihood of them moving plants to either South America or NA. As most of these laptops would be assembled from imported CKD (complete knock down kits), until such times that the part supplier have also setup shop around the laptop assembly plants.

US has already established a very efficient and cost effective car parts supply chain, which is something that Hyundai could tap into. Furthermore, the high labour costs in South Korea nullify any economic advantages (unless Korean government is subsidizing these manufacturing processes) that producing cars in SK and then ship them to US may have.

Hyundai and KIA are moving upmarket, and pretty much tracing their steps on that of the Japanese car manufacturer during those early years. Setting up plants in USA also allow the Korean car manufacturers to tap into economic support offered by the federal and the local state government.