Lenovo mobile phone mergers and acquisitions: or in different areas to consider acquisition opportunities

Zhang this round of Lenovo's acquisition of BlackBerry is a matter of seriousness, said the two sides have signed a closed agreement, the former has the right to access the latter's accounts. Wang Yu, the main member of the former DeLong system, even disclosed details of his two companies, although the results were unknown, "but it is clear that Lenovo is very interested in the BlackBerry, and it has already done a lot of preparatory work for the potential mergers and acquisitions." "But Lenovo has never denied any interest in buying blackberries, and when the first round of rumours spread, Lenovo chairman and CEO Yang said:" We have such goals and plans all year round (refers to the preparation of mergers and acquisitions), just like eating every day. "Lenovo CFO Wong said more clearly," we will not buy for acquisitions, even if the opportunity arises, and acquisitions are meaningful to us, we may not make acquisitions. "But anyhow, Yang will certainly give Lenovo senior vice president, Lenovo Group president Liu June a" gift ", on the one hand Lenovo mobile phone is eager to" go to sea ", on the other hand, he will not let Acer from Lenovo hand to steal Gateway (once the United States the 3rd largest PC manufacturer) things happen again, Acer has until now benefited from that acquisition. "We have a takeover plan on the PC, and we have a takeover, but the acquisition is an opportunity-driven, and the chances of success are greater when the market environment is bad," he said. "said Yang. Now, BlackBerry, HTC, even and LG, have fallen to Lenovo's "range", who is the final piece of "jigsaw"? Tangled up with patents, Lenovo had to prepare for acquisitions early on. Even Lenovo's patent for the entire group of half over the past two years has been on the mobile internet, and the new patents have outpaced the PC era, but they are still unable to solve the problem. "There is no doubt that patents are the biggest barrier to our inability to enter the U.S. market. "At the beginning of the year at the American electronic consumer show, Lenovo, a senior said. Next year is Lenovo's real entry into the mature market. A series of evaluations of smartphone business in Europe have been under way for a long time, according to Lanci, president of Lenovo's Europe, Middle East and Africa region. Liu June also said that the products used in the European and American markets have been in the late stages of research and development. All this requires Lenovo to solve many problems such as patents, operators and channels in a short time. Lenovo actually considered not to start mergers and acquisitions, whether the end of last year's "Think mobile phone", or just launched the "VIBE" brand, has proved this point. Haitao, senior director of product planning at Lenovo Group's mobile phone division, a former Samsung China Mobile communications Division, said, "After four years in Samsung, I know very well how the note and Galaxy S are made." "Lenovo is more willing to create its own high-end brand than mergers and acquisitions," he said. The failure of a generation of music phone in Lenovo has triggered a long time back, let Lenovo regret is at the right time point has made a good momentum, but the product is not reliable let Lenovo missed a good opportunity. This is also Liu June moved in the early 2011The chief executive of the interconnection and digital family Business Group is responsible for the thorough restructuring of the product development management process. K900 is a good result, with Lenovo mobile phone team for the product self-confidence more and more strong, some of them will naturally think that by virtue of their ability, the mature market is not unreachable. Liu June also rarely talked to outsiders about the strategy to enter the mature market, but Lenovo in this aspect of the layout of the moment did not stop. November 2012, the Motorola Nanjing Research and Development Center layoffs, Lenovo immediately set up a research and development center in Nanjing. Among the more than 500 employees who were laid off, Lenovo then grabbed 40 people and then dug dozens of more. Many of the core products in the U.S. market are developed by Motorola's Nanjing Research and Development Center. Later, Lenovo in the mobile phone flagship products on the market is intended to connect with the international market, including the NBA superstar Kobe Bryant endorsement of Lenovo mobile phones. Since the third quarter of 2012, Lenovo mobile phones in the domestic sales of the second, so that Liu June has enough to do their own trading, rather than through the acquisition. But as time progresses, Lenovo's internal mainstream voice began to favour acquisitions. On the one hand, after several major and successful acquisitions, Lenovo's mentality has changed a lot, "Today we are a genuine multinational companies, whether from the outside or from the inside look." The acquisition of IBM PCs has given us a lot to learn, and the way we think about mergers is more mature. "said Yang. On the other hand, Lenovo in the domestic market can not completely shake off the back of the opponents, although the product is good enough, but also have to fight with rivals price. If the early landing of the mature market, and expand the brand's awareness, will instantly improve Lenovo's competitiveness in the domestic market. Who's the jigsaw? What kind of puzzle does Lenovo need? First, there are enough patents, and useful enough, HTC was convicted of infringing Apple's patents at the end of 2011, banning access to the US market, which is almost the source of HTC's decline; second, with strong carrier relationships, more than 90% of mobile phones in mature markets are sold through carriers; third, To be in the consumer market has a strong brand effect; four, the acquisition price and acquisition difficulty in the scope of tolerance, the gradual stability of Lenovo is difficult to perform a "snake swallow elephant." In contrast to these approximate dimensions, there are no particularly suitable candidates. HTC is weaker than the patent, and its chairman, Wang, has said more than once that HTC is not for sale. For the BlackBerry, though its proprietary holdings are valued at $2.25 billion trillion, Lenovo is hard to digest. Lenovo's net profit for 2012 was $470 million trillion, with a profit margin of about 4.37%, and a 4.7 billion-dollar acquisition by BlackBerry equivalent to 10 times times the annual profitability of Lenovo. And the BlackBerry bled faster than Lenovo could bear, losing 965 million dollars in the second quarter of this year, with analysts predicting more than $2 billion in the next 6 quarters. More crucially, BlackBerry's brand value in the consumer market is small, and its advantages are in the enterprise-level market. Lenovo's two years in the European and American markets have been deeply feltHow hard it is to get into the consumer market, so the BlackBerry's short board may be the reason for the deal to be done. Lenovo executives have told reporters that Lenovo may continue to acquire the pace of acquisition on the PC, according to different regional markets to consider the opportunity to buy separately. Following the IBM PC, Lenovo's three other major acquisitions were Germany's Medion, NEC in Japan and CCE in Brazil. The common denominator of the three companies is that they are not leaders in regional markets, but the rankings have risen rapidly after joining Lenovo's global resources. And because the volume is small, Lenovo is particularly easy to digest. According to this logic, Lenovo is also likely to use vibe in mature markets, and then to acquire some regional brands rhythmically, slowly assimilate them into Lenovo's brand system. Challenge mergers and acquisitions just for the European and American markets, Lenovo mobile phone internationalization has come to the second step. Since last year, Lenovo's handsets have been listed in Russia, India and Southeast Asia, and have broken 10% in market share in several countries. The second wave started this year is Brazil, Ukraine, the Middle East and other countries and regions. According to Liu June, Lenovo in the above countries in the development of unusually smooth, "where the market competition easier." "Lenovo's price advantage makes it win a lot of low-end users." But executives, including Yang and Liu June, have endorsed the strategy. "The market is actually changing, from high-end to low-end to the lower end of the growth rate is obviously higher, which means we have taken a correct strategy from the outset." "said Yang. In a way, Lenovo has stood firm for 2000 Yuan, and its dominance in the supply chain is clear at this price segment. But Lenovo in "3000 Yuan" on a point of the problem, K900 performance, but did not give Lenovo too many surprises. K900 Initial internal pricing is 3999 yuan, and the final price only 2999 yuan, give up 1000 yuan profit space, the purpose is obvious. Liu June set the "Junlingzhuang" in May this year: More than Samsung in China within two years. In October, he told the Economic Observer that Lenovo had to think about how to grab a share from two of Samsung's hands, and Lenovo had to be qualified to stand in front of them as soon as possible. Today, Yang and Liu June have to visit foreign telecom operators frequently. In some countries with relatively well-developed public channels, Lenovo can also use local computer channels to sell handsets directly. But this is only a few cases, in most cases, Lenovo and the operator's bargaining power is not good. "It's not what we're good at, but that's the rule of the game in this area." "Lanci said. Even if they qualify for market access through mergers and acquisitions, a lot of work has been done since. "Our opportunity lies in the operators ' own changes, such as the North American operators who signed contracts with their customers, generally to sign years, and recently changed the content of the contract, allowing users to change the contract after one year, even after six months. "said Yang. The same example is happening in Singapore, where Lenovo's mobile phone is growingSpeed, precisely because of the shortening of the machine-changing cycle. Lenovo is always able to add the latest technical elements to its products in the shortest possible time. Liu June is a little impatient, and Yang always urges his progress every day. The entire midh (mobile interconnection and digital family business group) began to work overtime every day at the pace of startups. Although it now seems only a merger, but for Liu June, the challenge has only just begun.