'Jobs' Actor To Push China's Lenovo

Ashton Kutcher, the comedic actor who played Apple founder Steve Jobs in the recent movie about the late tech icon is now being paid by China's Lenovo to tout their wares.

Kutcher was launched as the face of Lenovo's new "Yoga" tablet in October. The old IBM Think Pad tech acquired by the Chinese is now inching its way into the U.S. market, surpassing bellwether firms like Dell and Hewlett Packard in the desktop space. Even though desktops are a dying breed in the personal computer category, Lenovo's market share in North America is rising while its market share in China is declining. According to the company, North American market share is expected to rise to 22% in 2014 from 15% currently, while China's share is seen slipping from 44% to 40%.

By the third quarter of this year, Lenovo's share of PC shipments rose to 17.5% from around 7% in the first quarter of 2009. The company is also hopping on the smart phone bandwagon and is staking out turf in Southeast Asia where China tech already has a foothold.

Mergers and acquisitions have been the firm's main source of expansion. It partnered in a JV with NEC Corp of Japan and Medion of Germay. Last year, it partnered with Compal Electronics of Taiwan and storage computing firm EMC in the U.S. Over in Brazil, it bought out CCE Ltda in a cash deal valued at $147 million, the company said.

PCs are one thing. What Lenovo really wants is growth in its tablet and smart phone business.

During the first fiscal quarter, Lenovo was the third-largest supplier of smart-connected devices (including PC, smartphone and tablet products), growing shipments 41% year over year.  Lenovo’s combined sales of smartphones and tablets surpassed PCs for the first time ever this year. In a press release dated Aug. 15, Lenovo said in its earnings that it was now the world’s fourth largest smartphone supplier and recorded the fastest growth among the top five vendors, growing 132%.

Lenovo's smartphone is the second most popular in China, behind Samsung, growing 12% year-over-year in the first quarter ending June 30.

Lenovo's gross profit for the first fiscal quarter increased 14% year-over-year to $1.2 billion, with gross margin at 13.6%. Operating profit for the quarter grew 11% year-over year to $202 million. Net cash reserves as of June 30, 2013, totaled $3.1 billion.

“In a tough PC market, Lenovo became the clear No. 1 for the first time and continues to improve profitability. Our strong performance in PC is fueled by balanced growth, through our consistent execution of the right strategy,” Yang Yuanqing, chairman and CEO of Lenovo said in a statement.  Besides smart phones and tablets, Lenovo is also targeting emerging markets. "(We are) better positioned than our competition to take advantage of these trends,” Yang said.

Kutcher's face on Lenovo's latest product line is an attempt to take on Samsung and Apple in the tablet space. For the low growth PC market, Lenovo has few real competitors.