Lenovo founder Liu Chuanzhi says he’s ‘humbled’ to receive Lifetime Achievement Award
Perseverance pays off for Liu, as Lenovo soars above its competition and is now the world’s biggest PC manufacturer
One of Asia’s most recognisable businessmen, Liu Chuanzhi, dubbed as the “Pioneer of Chinese capitalism,” is the winner of this year’s Lifetime Achievement Award at CNBC’s Asia Business Leaders Awards (ABLA).
“I feel inadequate and humbled, especially when compared to past winners,” Liu says about receiving the award.
The Chinese entrepreneur founded Legend, which later was renamed Lenovo , in 1984. At the time, Liu who was a researcher with the Chinese Academy of Sciences, when he and 10 engineers borrowed $25,000 from the state-backed institute to start their own computer business.
“As China was a closed economy then, computers were massive, but the functions were extremely limited,” says Liu, in a “Managing Asia” interview.
Red tape was one of the initial hurdles to becoming a PC maker in China, Liu says, noting that merely winning approval from authorities to be permitted to manufacture computers was difficult.
But Liu persevered and after much trial and error, in which the company reportedly tried its hand at importing televisions and selling digital watches before changing strategy to concentrate on producing its own products, introduced its first own-branded PC in 1990.