Lenovo not yet ready to do global mobiles

Don't expect Lenovo-branded mobile phones outside of the Chinese PC giant's home turf yet, according to the company's head honcho William Amelio.

Speaking at an industry-sharing event held in Singapore on Friday, Amelio admitted Lenovo did "entertain some ideas" about making its mobile phones available beyond the Chinese market. However, he noted, the time is not ripe, even though Lenovo's mobile business has gained traction steadily within China.

He said: "There are plenty of things on our plate right now - going global, for instance. [Taking our] mobile business [out of China] is not one of them."

Amelio noted that data from a research group in Beijing showed Lenovo's standing as a mobile phone player jumped from number 12 to number four within three years. Besides PCs and handhelds, Lenovo also manufactures servers.

Amelio said the company will focus for now on melding the "best practices" of both the Chinese business model of Lenovo as well as the global relationship-selling model of IBM's PC business, which the former acquired in 2004.

Although there are no plans to introduce mobile devices outside of China yet, Amelio said Lenovo is "brewing something in the background" with regard to low-cost PCs. However, he declined to reveal details.

Amelio added that Lenovo has already partnered Microsoft in its Flexgo programme in India, where customers can purchase PCs at a much lower price and subscribe to a pay-per-use model.

Vivian Yeo writes for ZDNet Asia