Going, Going, Gone: IBM Sells PC Group To Lenovo

It was rumored before, but now, as Rick Zeman writes, "It's official: According to news.com, IBM has sold their PC business in a complex arrangement where, 'under the deal, IBM will keep an 18.9 percent stake in Levono. Lenovo will pay $1.25 billion for the IBM PC unit and assume debt, which will bring the total cost to $1.75 billion. Lenovo will pay roughtly $650 million in cash and $600 million in securities.' Plus, Lenovo will be able to use the IBM and Think names for 5 years."

Comments

FP?

[mrkitty]

yes that's right, mod me down.

Re:Well gee

[hohack]

Apple? oh

Sucks!

[Alomex]

Time to buy your replacement Thinkpad, before quality drops like no tomorrow. My experience dealing with Chinese corporations is that they are penny pinching low paid operations whose quality is kept in check only by the demands of the western corporations that contract work out to them in the first palce.

Lenovo has almost no R&D and corporate policies of paying their employess $0.25 an hour. Will they have the patience to pay the US based thinkpad designers $100K a year and let them show late to work? or will they give them copies of Chairman Mao's red book and tell them to work 10 hours a day for minimum wage? As I said before my experience suggest the latter is the likelier scenario.

Re:Get a Gateway

[Anonymous Coward]

My god people can be stupid sometimes. I really hope you feel like an idiot.

Re:Down with Big Brother!

[Malor]

In 1984, we were sure Apple would wreck IBM. They told us so in the Superbowl!

In 1994, we were sure that IBM would wreck Apple.

In 2004, we now realize that we were smarter 20 years ago than 10. :-)

(and yes, I realize that IBM isn't 'wrecked', but it is very, very amusing that the ever-dying Apple outlasted IBM in the personal computer market. :) )

Re:Get a Gateway

[evilviper]

Folks, China is already the "factory of the world" and for far more than just toys and cloths.

That's quite true, sadly, and it's also true that their quality leaves much to be desired.

In the US, today, even when I buy products from previously high-quality brands, their Made-in-China products are as bad as the worst no-name junk. It's not as if the transfer of (almost) all manufacturing to China had no effect, it's a matter of the world changing, and people being happy to pay half as much for a product they will have to replace 10xs as often.

This is quite evident in the computer world as well. The respectable brands are still producing most of their equipment in places like Taiwan, not China.

I'm being as objective as I can. I have yet to see any quality products comming out of China, and I don't buy bargain-basement junk.