联想：掌控自己命运，从设计自家芯片开始

根据EETimes美国版的独家消息，中国第二大智能手机品牌供货商联想(Lenovo)打算扩大投入芯片设计业务，锁定智能手机/平板装置应用领域。 过去十年来，联想内部一直有个编制约10人左右的芯片设计团队，来自产业界的消息来源指出，该公司现在正在招募芯片设计工程师，打算在今年中将该团队扩充至100人左右的规模；该匿名消息来源指出，联想将在分别在深圳与北京招募40与60名工程师。 针对以上消息，联想并未有立即响应；而根据笔者分析，该公司此举是希望能掌控自家智能手机与平板装置的命运──就像是拥有芯片设计公司海思(HiSilicon)的华为(Huawei)那样。 不同于三星(Samsung) 或苹果(Apple)，联想拥有一段为智能手机选择不同应用处理器供货商的坎坷过程；在2011年推出的联想A60智能手机中，该公司采用的是联发科 (MediaTek)的MT6573芯片，但2012年推出的LePhone K860产品，则是第一家采用三星电子Exynos 4四核心应用处理器的非三星手机厂商。 而联想在今年稍早推出的5.5寸屏幕智能手机K900，则是采用了英特尔的第一款双核心Atom芯片；该款Atom Z2580芯片号称性能是英特尔单核心Medfield 芯片──应用于联想一年前推出的K800手机──的一倍。 也许联想曾经享受过这种可任意选择市场上最佳应用处理器的自由，但根据消息来源指出，现实是残酷的，因为三星电子拒绝再供应最新的Exynos应用处理器给这家中国竞争对手。

2012年中国智能手机市场前五大品牌市占率比较
Source：Strategy AnalyticsVKResmc

本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载 本文下一页：联想已经成为三星在中国的最大对手

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• 独家报道：中国正通过品牌产品战略崛起
• 2013智能手机市场，中兴需慎防联想夺位VKResmc

{pagination} 确实，在成长蓬勃的中国智能手机市场上，联想已经成为三星的最大对手──在 2012年，三星在中国智能手机市场的占有率为17.7%，联想与苹果则分别为13.2%与11%。 在此同时，联想藉由强化管理团队阵容，为变成一家领导级消费性电子品牌做准备；这家排名全球第二大的PC品牌，在2月份时邀雅虎(Yahoo)共同创办人杨 致远(Jerry Yang)担任该公司董事会观察员(board observer)，接着又聘请ARM创办人之一Tudor Brown担任非执行董事，为该公司产业老将顾问团又添一名成员。 联想的百人芯片设计团队将会在已经稍嫌拥挤的应用处理器市场激起什么涟漪，还有待时间观察；而根据华为首席销售官邵洋(Shao Yang)最近接受EETimes美国版专访时的说法，拥有自家芯片设计部门对于一家手机厂商来说，是：“更有利于与其它半导体业者协商。” 本文授权编译自EE Times，版权所有，谢绝转载 编译：Judith Cheng 参考英文原文：Exclusive: Lenovo to design own chips，by Junko Yoshida

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• 手机与平板MEMS运动传感器主要买家排名，中国厂商合计第三
• 独家报道：中国正通过品牌产品战略崛起
• 2013智能手机市场，中兴需慎防联想夺位VKResmc

{pagination} Exclusive: Lenovo to design own chips Junko Yoshida While beefing up its senior management team to prepare itself to become a leading consumer electronics vendor, Lenovo is growing its IC design team to about 100 engineers by mid this year. BEIJING, China– Lenovo, the second largest smartphone supplier in China, will get into the chip design business with a special focus on smartphones and tablets, EE Times has learned. The company, which has maintained a small IC design team consisting of about 10 people over the last decade, is now committed to expanding this team to about 100 engineers by the middle of this year, according to a China-based industry source with direct knowledge of Lenovo’s recruitment of chip designers. Lenovo will be hiring 40 engineers in Shenzhen area and 60 in Beijing, according to the source, who asked to remain anonymous. Lenovo, based in Beijing, did not immediately respond to questions about these plans. This initiative appears to be driven by the company’s desire to control its own destiny in smartphones and tablets--a la HiSilicon at Huawei. (HiSilicon is a chip division of Huawei.) Unlike Samsung or Apple, Lenovo has a checkered history of adopting different apps processors from a variety of suppliers for its smartphones. The company adopted MediaTek’s MT6573 in the Lenovo A60 smartphone in 2011, while it became the first company--outside Samsung --in 2012 to design in Samsung Electronics’ quad-core apps processor Exynos 4 in its LePhone K860. Lenovo, however, announced earlier this year a 5.5-inch smartphone, dubbed K900, by integrating Intel’s first dual-core Atom chip for phones. The Atom Z2580 is said to have roughly doubled the CPU performance of Intel’s single-core Medfield processor used in Lenovo’s K800 phone, which was introduced a year ago. While Lenovo might have been enjoying its freedom in choosing the best apps processor available on the market, reality bit hard, sources said, when Samsung Electronics refused to supply its newest version of the Exynos apps processor to the Chinese company. Market share of the top five vendors for China’s smartphone market in 2012 Source: Strategy Analytics · Indeed, on the growing Chinese smartphone market last year, Lenovo became Samsung’s biggest rival--with Samsung holding a 17.7 percent share, with Lenovo at 13.2 percent and Apple at 11 percent. Meanwhile, Lenovo has been beefing up its senior management team to prepare itself to become a leading consumer electronics vendor. The world's second-largest supplier of personal computers last month (February) named Jerry Yang, the co-founder and former CEO of Yahoo, as a "board observer.” Further, Lenovo added Tudor Brown, one of the founders of ARM, as a non-executive director to Lenovo's roster of seasoned veterans. It’s far from clear if an internal group of mere 100 IC engineers can make a dent in the already crowded apps processor market. And yet, as Shao Yang, CMO of Huawei Device, recently said in an interview with EE Times, having a chip division of its own could help [the handset company] “negotiate better with other semiconductor companies.”