Do you have any strategy around operating systems, in particular Linux? Are there any plans to offer notebooks or desktops running Linux?
We do work with some of our larger enterprise customers with Linux and in those cases we do offer it preloaded to them. We don't have a Linux machine on our top-seller range but there are some of our resellers who are doing exactly that. It is there and the fact that a reseller for small business is now offering that is quite a significant change.
What effect will the release of Windows Vista have on the market?
Every time you give people a change point like that then they will probably take the opportunity to consider their options, and Linux could come out as strong contender in that case. However I do know that Microsoft is working to make their Vista release as bug-free as they can. I think it will come down to, as usual, a set of customers that are pioneers to Vista before the masses follow behind them. The challenge for us is to make the machines compatible for Vista today.
What have been the cultural changes moving from US to Chinese parents?
We have a pretty balanced executive team made up of Americans and Chinese. But in terms of specific Chinese management style there are a few things you can look back on in Lenovo's history. They have a very considered, long-term strategic view for the company; they made decisions within the company with the aim of becoming a global organisation. They took the decision to rename the company from Legend to Lenovo because Lenovo was a more internationally accepted name. They sponsored the Winter Olympics as a signal of being a global entity and global success.
There was some question of why a company would get into the desktop business today, as it's a pretty low-margin, uninspiring market. Obviously you wouldn't agree with that...
Our focus at IBM was creating a productivity machine for users that saved money across the life of the machine and wasn't necessarily focused on reducing the price on day one. Just by the fact that it doesn't break when it is dropped, for instance, means it is far more productive and will cost you less in the long run.
Dell seems to be the competitor to go after — HP has up to recently not been a happy ship — but how do you see yourselves competing with Dell's direct sales model?
Ours is obviously a channel model, theirs is direct, but I have seen recently that they have begun to talk to the channel more than they ever did in the past.
But wasn't the acquisition by Lenovo an opportunity to rethink the sales strategy at all — maybe consider direct sales?
To be honest, you're right that we do have the opportunity to re-think our route to market and that is being done as part of our channel strategy but the net of that is we will still be a channel-based company. As we move forward into consumer that piece of work is still being done but it will probably still involve a route to market that involves partners.
Could there be some direct sales then?
Again — we haven't finished that work but my expectation is that it will involve partners. It could be one of those things that looks direct but will actually involve partners.
