Lenovo Group announced the creation of new global organizations to drive its industry-leading innovation and customer satisfaction.

Effective October 15, the company is uniting its Lenovo brand and recently acquired IBM Personal Computing Division operations globally, combining the separate product groups, supply and sales structures into unified global organizations.

First, to continue the ThinkPad and Lenovo tradition of industry-leading innovation, Lenovo is unifying its global computer products and product marketing activities in a new Product Group, led by Frances K. O’Sullivan, senior vice president and COO, Product Group. The Group will develop and manage all Lenovo-, Think- and IBM-branded Lenovo computer products worldwide. Ms. O’Sullivan previously was senior vice president and COO, Lenovo International. The Product Group will include new global business units for notebooks and desktops, as well as options, services and quality.

Second, to achieve the greatest operational efficiency, Lenovo will combine all elements of its supply chain into a new Global Supply Chain organization, led by Liu Jun, senior vice president and COO, Global Supply Chain, with responsibility for global procurement, logistics, fulfillment and sales support, supply planning, strategy and manufacturing operations. Mr. Liu was previously senior vice president and COO, Lenovo China.

Third, to ensure the highest levels of customer satisfaction, Lenovo will expand from three to five geographies responsible for customer sales and service, led by Ravi Marwaha, as senior vice president, Geographies. The Lenovo Geography organizations in the Americas and EMEA remain unchanged. Lenovo Asia Pacific will focus on the critical markets of Japan, Korea, Australia/New Zealand, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and ASEAN. Think and Lenovo operations in China, Lenovo’s fourth Geography, will now be fully integrated under the leadership of Chen Shaopeng, vice president and general manager, China. Finally, as of January 1, 2006, Lenovo will elevate one of its fastest-growing countries to establish a fifth Geography, Lenovo India. Also reporting to Mr. Marwaha, who is currently Lenovo’s worldwide head of sales, is Lenovo’s global business partner operation.

The company also said that Lenovo’s advanced research centers in Beijing, China; Yamato, Japan; and Raleigh, North Carolina, USA will operate together as a single organization led by George He, who is now chief technology officer.

“The global organizations we announced today are designed to implement Lenovo’s strategy of innovation, operational excellence and delivering the highest levels of customer satisfaction in mature and emerging markets. Customers tell us the top reasons they choose our products are ThinkPad and Lenovo design and quality. These moves poise us to bring innovations like our “airbag technology” — which protects hard-drive data — or “one-button virus recovery” to broader markets, even more quickly and efficiently,” said Steve Ward, president and chief executive officer of Lenovo.

“The fully integrated Lenovo will bring more innovative products and services to our customers faster, exciting new career opportunities for our employees and growth for our partners,” said Yang Yuanqing, chairman of Lenovo. “With these changes, Lenovo becomes a truly integrated international company, which will help us to build a more competitive business model, further enhance efficiency and improve our cost structure. This also allows us to be more aggressive in developing SMB markets while maintaining our competitive edge in the large enterprise market.”