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Lenovo is the most prestigious Chinese brand. Its original company, Legend, changed its name into Lenovo in 2003, and bought the personal computer (PC) division from Industrial Business Machines in 2005. (Quelch and Knoop, 2006). The process of acquiring foreign strategic assets for international expansion was analyzed as a “government underwriting because when the negotiation was in progress, Lenovo was a State Owned Enterprise” (Deng, 2009). The major competitive advantages that contributed to Lenovo success were related to:

• strong brand recognition in China with several sub-brands covered by the umbrella Lenovo (Tian desktop series, Soleil and Xuri notebook computers, Wanqan servers … );

• highly efficient operations, namely a product delivery lead-time of three to five days.

• diversified distribution channels, including value-added resellers as well as franchised shops;

• co-branding strategy in adopting the Lenovo-IBM logo to its products; and

• communication campaign in the early 1990s with the slogan “What is the world going to be if we stop dreaming” for Legend.

Lenovo became a “corporate brand and a master product brand” (Kotler and Pfoertsh, 2007). In May 2005, it selected Ogilvy & Mather to handle worldwide brand advertising for Lenovo for a campaign of integrated marketing communication that would include online ads, event sponsorships and TV in addition to print. They are also using one worldwide tagline “New World, New Thinking”.

In March 2004, Lenovo joined the Olympic Partner Program of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) as the first Chinese company to become the computer technology equipment partner of the IOC for the period from 2005 to 2008. A Beijing 2008 Olympics partnership will give Lenovo a tremendous opportunity to communicate to billions of TV viewers on a par with prestigious global brands such as GE, McDonald's, Samsung, Panasonic or Kodak. The charismatic personality of Mr Yang Yuanqing, graduated...