As demand booms, Lenovo upgrades laptop production
People work in Lenovo's Hefei manufacturing base. One in eight laptop computers in the world is made at the base.
Lenovo Group Ltd has opened two new automated production lines in Hefei, Anhui Province, after its record-high laptop sales in the second quarter during the COVID-19 pandemic, the world’s top personal computer vendor said.
LCFC (Hefei) Electronics Technology Co, Lenovo’s largest computer research and manufacturing base globally, sold 26 million computers, servers and smart device units to 126 countries and regions in 2019. Among every eight laptops sold in the world, one comes from LCFC, headquartered in Hefei.
The two lines, with smart manufacturing features like 5G, data analysis, industrial Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence, will improve Lenovo’s production capacity and efficiency.
Lenovo’s production upgrade is the latest example of a Chinese firm to resume production and speed up innovation during the pandemic.
The pandemic has boosted sales of laptops globally with new demands for remote work, online education and gaming. The trend will continue this year, said Bai Peng, Lenovo’s vice president and LCFC’s chief executive.
LCFC’s sales reached 8.34 million units in the second quarter, a record high for ThinkPad and other device sales.
Hefei Jingwei Electronics Technology, a component supplier for LCFC, is expected to see 40 percent sales growth in the first nine months, said Xiong Xianjun, general manager of Hefei Jingwei.
EYang, another supplier for LCFC, is building a new factory near Hefei with 10-fold production capacity for clients including Lenovo, Huawei and Xiaomi.
The smart manufacturing upgrade will help LCFC improve efficiency, expand capacity and deepen cooperation with its suppliers.
Lenovo is building an ecosystem for laptop production with its suppliers and partners in “four-hour drive circle” regions. In Anhui Province, Lenovo and its partners have created 16,000 jobs, said Bai.
