Where tech industry sees PC saturation, Lenovo spots ‘a lot of potential’
Chinese computer firm sets sights on growing market share amid sales uptick
TORONTO When research firms IDC and Gartner both reported an uptick in PC computer sales in July after years of stagnation, people in the tech world took notice.
Laptops and desktops are seen as mature markets; by and large, especially in North America, personal computers have hit market saturation, and the rate of change has slowed.
While the uptick in PC sales is being mostly attributed to a cyclical corporate inventory refresh, for Lenovo, the Chinese company that acquired IBM’s PC and laptop division in 2005, overall growth of the market is only part of the picture.
Lenovo North America president Matthew Zielinski said internally the company had “felt some tailwinds brewing ” in recent months, but he was “elated” with the IDC report in particular, which showed his company gaining market share.
“The way I look at it is a little bit different. Whether the market is growing or shrinking, or buying cycles are shortening or elongating, when you’re 13, 14 or 15 per cent of a market that is enormous, and you’re half the size of your next largest competitor, you’ve got plenty of room to grow,” he said.
“I don’t lose sleep at night thinking that the market is contracting or buying cycles are slowing, because we have definitively just a heck of a lot of potential that we can capitalize on.”
Lenovo reported earnings Thursday morning; the Chinese company reported first-quarter net profit of $77 million on revenue of $11.91 billion, beating analyst forecasts.
In their North American division, Zielinski said Lenovo’s plans focus on increasing market share by 25 to 50 basis points each quarter, and that’s the part he was thrilled with from the IDC report in July.
“From a numbers standpoint, since it’s a public display of progress, we’ll talk about market share,” he said.
“Our IDC results came back and we took about 170 basis points as a North American region, and about 200 basis points in Canada.”
In some ways, the really exciting stuff is happening away from the laptops and the 2-in-1 laptop/ tablets.
While there’s only so much you can do with a screen, a keyboard, and enough computing power and memory to make it run, with something like virtual reality headsets, there’s still a lot of room to play around and figure out what works best.
The company has introduced products like their smart display, which is essentially like a Google Home smart speaker, but with a built-in screen to display more information, and Lenovo has been marketing virtual reality goggles for educational purposes.
Zielenski said they’re also looking to make devices that solve other problems in the corporate realm.
“For example, think about what kind of problems need improvement or solving. One problem that we’ve identified that needs significant examination is workforce transformation and basically conference room management,” Zielinski said, pointing to the company’s ThinkSmart Hub.
“Basically, it’s a one-touch solution to start a conference call, so you’re not screwing around with plugging cords in or getting the wrong dial-in information, and you know, wasting 10 or 15 minutes of an hour on productivity.”