Marc Godin, VP and General Manager of Lenovo Middle East, Turkey, and Africa. (Photography by Darryl Linington).
At the Lenovo Innovation Summit, which was held in Cape Town at CTICC, Marc Godin - Vice President and General Manager of Lenovo, Middle East and Africa - had stated in his keynote presentation that Lenovo had evolved and grown over the years.
“Lenovo has grown and extended across the world and more importantly across new and different segments and markets. We have seen growth in the smartphone market and Lenovo has also seen growth in their data centre since the acquisition of the IBM X server business,” said Godin.
According to Godin, Lenovo is additionally investing in startup companies that are dealing with new and emerging technologies.
Godin stated during his presentation that, “Having started as a very small company operating in one single country in one single market, we have grown since to become a large global cooperation operating across the world supporting and serving customers in about 160 countries, clearly we have become a global IT company.”
Godin additionally added that the company has established a solid number one position in the PC market.
When discussing the future of the firm's laptop division Godin added that “We have delivered the latest version of our flagship product the Thinkpad X1 Carbon. This is the lightest 14-inch business laptop in the industry. It is thinner, lighter and more powerful than ever.”
Godin continued by stating that, “We have extended the Yoga franchise into the commercial space, with the introduction of the Yoga X1, this is again the thinnest and lightest 14-inch 2-in-1 in the history.”
Lenovo and Cloud Technology
Godin stated that the cloud is a preferred ideal way for corporations and governments to consume IT. He said the key considerations are mostly around the delivery model. Whether it is public, private or hybrid and there are considerations around security, confidentiality of data and availability.
“We are ready to support you, to work with you and address trends, again internally we have structured, organised our development teams along priorities. The first is having the right components and set of skills the build the right combination of data centres infrastructure and cloud services to support your mission-critical workloads.
Smarter Devices and the Future
Lenovo wants to invent new devices that look to take advantage of the cloud capabilities. “A PC today does only what you are asking it to do and it interacts with you in the same similar way whether you are a young child, a teenager, a working professional or a senior. Our vision is that artificial intelligence again coupled with cloud services will enable smarter devices”, said Godin.
Explaining what these smarter devices will do Godin added that, “A smarter device will be able to understand how different each of us are, how differently we are using our devices, how differently we are using applications on that device and a smarter device should be able to adapt to provide a customised experience.
Godin added that a smarter device should be able to know its location and react differently depending on the environment. It will also start making suggestions as well as guide us and maybe take action without being asked because it is responding.
Speaking about Lenovo’s future, Godin said that the company is entering into the fourth industrial revolution. “This revolution is essentially fuelled by powerful Artificial Intelligence coupled with almost infinite computing powered by cloud services, accessible everywhere through high-speed networks. These technologies will fundamentally disturb businesses, change societies, change the way we work and the way we live.
"We believe that these technologies will enable smarter devices, which will provide different experiences. We believe this revolution will require further advancements in data centre, even more agility and flexibility. We want to become leaders in this new world. Our aspiration is to become customer-centric in everything we do," he concluded.
By: Fundisiwe Maseko
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