IBM-Lenovo Deal Now Official
from the bye-bye-thinkpad dept
As expected, IBM and Lenovo have officially announced the sale of IBM's PC division to Lenovo for $1.25 billion. The only thing surprising at this point is the price. Much of it is in stock, and IBM will end up with an 18.9% stake in Lenovo. However, $1.25 billion seems awfully low for such an established brand. For many, obviously, this signals quite a milestone -- seeing as non-Mac desktop computers used to be referred to as IBM compatibles. What will be interesting to watch, however, is what happens next. Many fans of the Thinkpad (including myself) may worry that Lenovo will let the quality of the product drop to the level of other laptops on the market these days. While Dell has dismissed the deal as not being a threat, you can bet that Lenovo is likely to more heavily market the PC (both laptop and desktop) than IBM, as they really want to build a strong presence in the US -- while IBM had clearly moved on to other focus areas a long time ago.
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