Speaking of Lenovo, many Chinese people should be familiar with it. Although it is much smaller than Samsung, Lenovo is at least a world-renowned brand now. On the surface, Lenovo is currently recognized as the largest PC manufacturer in the world. However, if you look closely, Lenovo has inextricably linked to multiple partners, including Motorola and Microsoft. , IBM
With the cooperation of companies such as IBM, the entire industry has become very huge. So, what do you know about Lenovo? Let’s talk about Lenovo’s impressive history through 10 interesting points from the past.
In 1984, Lenovo Group was established, more than 30 years ago.
In the field of technology, Lenovo is considered an old manufacturer with certain qualifications. It has been established for 30 years. It was first established on November 1, 1984. It is more familiar to everyone now. HTC (1997) and Huawei (1987) were still early. At that time, Liu Chuanzhi led a group of more than ten engineers and established it with assets of 200,000 yuan. However, this funding was still provided by the Chinese Academy of Sciences. The company was initially named "New Technology Developer Inc.", which few people know so far.
In 1988, the Lenovo brand name was "Legend" and it was used for 15 years.
A few years after the establishment of New Technology R&D Company, the company began to seek changes. In 1988, it acquired a new English name "Legend" and began a domestic PC sales business, responsible for installing machines for enterprises and individuals. However, in 2003, Lenovo really launched the name "Lenovo" that is still used today.
In 1990, Lenovo released the Legend PC, Lenovo's first self-branded personal computer and its first real success.
1990
In 1990, Lenovo began to launch its first branded personal computer after changing its name to "Legend". At that time, IBM was at its peak and achieved great success in the PC market. This was very important to Legend.
This is a very significant blow to PC, especially China and other Asian markets. In fact, Legend PC
attracted millions of Chinese consumers who were not very familiar with computer technology at the time, and received official support from the Torch Center of the Ministry of Science and Technology of China, so it was considered to have gained recognition in the country. The first success.
After Lenovo Group issued a recruitment advertisement in 1988, its staff quadrupled, including current CEO Yang Yuanqing, who also joined the company at that time.
Lenovo's development was very slow and difficult in the early days of its establishment. Many employees could only walk when going out, and there was no public transportation. But Lenovo's first major growth came after a job ad appeared on the front page of China Youth Daily in 1988.
At that time, this Lenovo photo received an enthusiastic response, with more than
500 applicants. After the written examination, 280 candidates were left, but only 120 got the opportunity to be interviewed, and in the end only 58 hired. The average age of these employees is about 26 years old, and only three or four of them have undergraduate degrees. But the most interesting thing is that these people include Yang Yuanqing, who is now Lenovo’s CEO.
In 2003, the Lenovo brand was renamed "Lenovo" and spent a lot of money on publicity.
As mentioned earlier, Lenovo's first rebranding was in
2003
and was renamed "lenovo". Yang Yuanqing once said that the main reason was Because the name "Legend" seems too common. After all, if you want to develop into an international brand of high-tech company, you must change the name. Where did the name "Lenovo" come from? According to the information, "Le" is taken from "Legend", and "novo" is a Latin root, which represents "new idea", so the basic new meaning is to create "new legend".
After changing the company name, Lenovo launched a wave of quite powerful marketing activities, including purchasing huge advertisements around the world and broadcasting advertisements during peak viewing hours. For this purpose, Lenovo spent about
p>18 million yuan. Most of Lenovo's advertisements have the blue sky as the background, and the slogan reads "Beyond your imagination!", which in English is "Transcendence depends on
how you think!"
1997 , Lenovo has been highly profitable since then thanks to its agreement with Microsoft.
In the late 1990s, most of Lenovo's success was limited to China. But Lenovo hoped to become more of an internationally recognized brand, so in 1997 Lenovo chose to start cooperation with Microsoft. This was the most profitable business ever for a Chinese company in that era, at least until 2000.
In 2005, Lenovo acquired IBM's PC division and became the third largest PC manufacturer in the world.
A controversial move in Lenovo's development history was its acquisition of IBM's PC division. After completing the acquisition for $1.75 billion, Lenovo became the world's third-largest PC maker
However, the transaction figure is more than four times Lenovo's annual sales. In retrospect, this should be one of Lenovo's most successful business moves to date. Lenovo also recently took over IBM's X86 server business, helping the company gain a foothold in the enterprise market.
In 2014, Lenovo acquired Motorola's mobile device division
In
Motorola suffered a setback in the 2000s and split into two companies: Motorola Resolved Solutions (Motorola
Solutions) and Motorola Mobility (Motorola
Mobility), the latter is the mobile device department, which was first acquired by Google. For this reason, Google obtained a large number of technology patents, and subsequently Google then sold the unit to Lenovo, with the transaction amount moving to US$3 billion.
Just like the acquisition of IBM's PC division, Lenovo mobile phones suddenly rose to the position of the third largest smartphone manufacturer in the world. Outsiders believe that due to the continuous decline of the PC market, Lenovo has to pay attention to the smartphone market in order to ensure the sustainability of development. However, the Motorola brand acquired by Lenovo is now in a period of consolidation.
In 2015, Lenovo launched a new logo
Lenovo’s logo has always been very impressive, but in 2015, Lenovo unveiled a new brand The logo and slogan "Never Stand
Still" express the brand's determination to transform to the Internet and its attitude of continuing to move forward and expand the international market. The new logo abandons the italic design that Lenovo has used for 12 years. Only the "e" letter is retained in the entire word, and it is a more refreshing and simple solid color, pattern or image. Its new slogan "Never Stand
Still" means "never stop" or "never rest on its laurels" in Chinese.
Today, Lenovo accounts for about 20% of global PC sales, and PCs still account for 65% of the company's total revenue
After acquiring IBM's PC business due to its partnership with Microsoft , Lenovo has always maintained its position as the world's leading PC brand. Lenovo currently has about 20% market share in the PC market. Meanwhile, while a few years ago PC sales accounted for 80% of the company's total revenue, today that number is down to 65% thanks to the growing mobile segment.