Having 'good' products is not nearly good enough for Lenovo

In the crowded world of the mobile industry, having good products is not nearly good enough.

It's important to deliver innovative products that will not get lost in the sea of tech items that flood the market seemingly on a weekly basis. If it's a product that is not better than what others offer, consumers are going to look elsewhere. One has to wow the consumer at every possible chance.

In so many words, this is what JD Howard, Lenovo's VP for Mobile Internet Digital Home and worldwide business development, said on the sidelines of the four-day Mobile World Congress (MWC) held here last February 23 to 26. MWC, as the name suggests, is the annual gathering of the biggest and most important names in the mobile world. It's here where many brands launch their latest flagship items.

“Our innovative products have always been key to our success. As we expand our PC Plus business (with smartphones and tablet offerings), we'll continue to stick to some core brand values—quality, durability, innovation and usability—and pivot that trust to our new line of products,” he said.

This is why, during the Mobile World Congress, which saw some 72,000 participants from all over the world, Lenovo launched the next generation of smartphones in its popular S-series—the S860, S850, and S660, which features sleek and sexy design elements and impressive battery life.

Lenovo also unveiled the new YOGA Tablet 10 HD+, a multimode Android device that features a bigger display real estate (compared to the 8-inch display of the original release), with Full HD capabilities. MWC visitors also got first dibs on the new suite of DOit apps that are designed to help people easily share, sync, protect and manage precious information on their gadgets. (Expect more detailed reviews of the devices and the apps in future articles).

Howard stressed the importance of the ASEAN market, particularly emerging countries like the Philippines, Indonesia, and Vietnam, where many individuals get their first experience of the Internet through their smartphones.

“These are very important markets for us because they are the ones hungry for innovation. Fortunately for us, many of the firsts that we've had, and we've had a lot, answer a lot of what those markets need,” Howard said.

While Lenovo is the global leader in PCs (18.5 percent worldwide market share for the October-December 2013 period, the largest in the world), the company is fast-becoming a major player in smart connected devices (PCs+tablets+smartphones) as the third biggest brand in this arena.

To wit, Lenovo's combined sales of smartphones and tablets have been outstripping its PC counterpart for the last two consecutive quarters. Lenovo is now the fourth largest smartphone player, with 4.8 percent share, growing shipments by 47 percent year-on-year.

In the last quarter of 2013 alone, Lenovo sold a total of 15.3 million PCs, while its smartphone and tablet sales checked in at 17.3 million. That's a total of 32.6 million devices sold for the quarter—or some 5 devices sold every second.

“One of the key success factors for the brand is the strength of our supply chain capability. We have a solid experience in this with our PC business, and now that culture is doing great things for our smartphones and tablets offerings,” he said.

Lenovo's tremendous rise in the smartphone market could be atttributed to the release of its flagship device—the Lenovo K900 smartphone (with basketball superstar Kobe Bryant as its ambassador); as well as its line of Vibe phones—the Vibe X and Vibe Z.

In the ASEAN region, Lenovo is the third biggest smartphone vendor in the Philippines (12.1 percent market share) and Indonesia (9.1 percent), according to data from IDC (February 2014). In Malaysia (8.3 percent) and Vietnam, (6.5 percent), Lenovo places fourth in each country's smartphone market share. In Thailand, Lenovo's smartphone market share stands at 4 percent.

Howard said: “Lenovo is still relatively a young player, especially in the smartphone and tablet world, and this is perhaps why we're so eager to let everyone experience the ease, beauty, and simplicity of our products.”

*** This article was slightly edited for TWIST. It first appeared in the Philippine Daily Inquirer's Gadget section on March 26, 2014. ***