China tells public sector to ditch foreign PCS

CHINA is planning to replace tens of millions of Western computers used by its public sector with locally built alternatives running on Chinese operating systems.

Government officials have been asked to make the switch, according to reports that said it could affect 50m devices.

Shares in Hong Kong-headquartered Lenovo rose 2.1pc. The company acquired the desktop manufacturing arm of IBM in 2005 and is a leading maker of desktops and laptops.

Lenovo’s products have traditionally relied on West- ern-designed tech, however, in recent years it has begun offering budget laptops using Chinese-designed cen- tral processing units from Zhaoxin Semiconductor.