Opinion | Lenovo CEO breaks with old rhetoric of ambition for big donation
It's refreshing to see Lenovo's (HKEx: 992) chatty CEO Yang Yuanqing finally doing something besides boasting about his big plans for the company, with word that he is donating a big chunk of his annual bonus to ordinary employees. I'm a bit too jaded to believe that Yang's donation of US$3 million is a purely selfless act, since he was quite willing to give the media a detailed account of his decision. Still, the latest news comes as a nice break from the usual chatter about new M&A targets and other global aspirations from one of China's most successful tech firms.
It's worth noting that Yang won't exactly suffer too much as a result of his generosity, since his last annual bonus was reportedly worth US$5.2 million, and his net personal income for the year totaled US$14 million. Still, I'm willing to give him credit for making what looks like a sincere effort to thank the many people who have helped to make Lenovo China's first truly world-class tech firm.
For me personally, the news of Yang's generosity also comes as a nice shift from his usual bluster about his ambitious plans for Lenovo, along with the non-stop rumours about the company's latest acquisition targets. After taking over as Lenovo's CEO in 2009, it was hard to ever go more than a month or two without reading news reports citing Yang discussing his ambition to overtake Hewlett-Packard (NYSE: HPQ) to become the world's biggest PC seller.
After finally achieving that goal briefly last year, Yang suddenly changed his tune as sales of traditional PCs started to decline in the face of the rapid rise of smaller, more portable devices including smartphones and tablet PCs. Over the past year, he has shifted his message to say Lenovo's chief rivals are now smartphone and tablet PC giants Apple (Nasdaq: AAPL) and Samsung (Seoul: 005930), which he happily repeats time and again whenever he conducts interviews.
When Yang isn't talking up his HP- or Apple-chasing dreams, Lenovo is also frequently in the headlines for its voracious appetite for overseas acquisitions. This year alone the company has been in the headlines for a number of potential deals, including a smartphone joint venture with Japan's NEC (Tokyo: 6701) and the potential multibillion-dollar purchase of IBM's (NYSE: IBM) low-end server businesses. Many industry observers have also speculated that Lenovo is likely to make a bid for sputtering smartphone pioneer BlackBerry (Toronto: BB), which put itself up for sale last month.