MORRISVILLE – In a global videoconference last week, Lenovo CEO Yang Yuanqing and other company executives outlined the company’s updated goals and new strategy: to be a solutions company, not just a device company.
WRAL TechWire spoke with Lenovo regarding this strategic shift in an interview conducted by email, and the lightly edited transcript is below.
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TW: Lenovo reported double-digit growth in its solutions and services line of business, and noted that this growth accounted for 8 percent of revenue. Given the new strategic focus, how is the company planning for continued growth, and are there set targets the company expects to meet?
Lenovo: Growth will be driven by our new corporate structure, effective April 1st that brings together services and solutions teams and capabilities from across the company into one dedicated organization called Solutions and Services Group (SSG). SSG will further drive the company’s transformation by delivering incremental business across smart verticals leveraging IoT, edge, attached services, managed services and our ‘as a service offerings’ including DaaS and Truscale™. We are not sharing any targets for this new group yet.
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TW: The company stated a goal to remain at the top of the global market for PC manufacturing and sales. WRAL TechWire recently reported that amidst an enormous increase in PC sales in the first quarter of 2021, Lenovo did finish atop the market. How does Lenovo see its device—and in particular, PCs—business changing given the strategic shift recently announced?
Lenovo: We see the year-on-year growth for the PC market as a long-term shift in the technology sector that is sustainable well beyond the pandemic. Working and lifestyle changes over the last year have changed the landscape of the PC industry, including moving from one device per family, to one device per person, and accelerating business transformation driven by technology solutions—of which PCs are a component. We see strong demand in education and gaming in particular, fueled by the past year.
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TW: Let’s take a local lens on this strategic shift. What does the strategy shift—toward solutions and services—mean for the facility in the Triangle?
Lenovo: The strategic shift will see some team members in the Triangle have their reporting lines move into the new SSG business group, where their role aligns with our future strategies. We are focused on long-term profitable growth for the company, but have no plans to share at this time about headcount growth specifically in the Triangle.
