Lenovo President/COO Understands Netbooks

It’s really nice to see a higher-up in a tech company saying sensible things about netbooks.  In CNET’s piece on the changes in Lenovo’s leadership, Rory Reed, the new president and chief operating officer, responded to the idea that netbooks are hurting sales of traditional notebooks.

“I’m not concerned about that,” he said. “I think that consumers take the time to understand the product set…I think Netbooks is not a ‘cheap PC.’ Netbooks is a solution that allows customers to do a set of work activities and productivity items that allows them to be efficient: e-mail, Web access, some light application work.”

Erica Ogg points out that Lenovo’s mainstream laptops are premium models, thus the gap between them and netbooks is large enough that consumers considering one won’t really think about the other.  I’m not convinced that the Dells and HPs of the world are more in danger from “cannibalization” than Lenovo.  Mr. Reed is spot on in recognizing how consumers view netbooks:

[Lenovo] sees Netbooks as a primary PC in some emerging markets, but for most customers, a secondary PC with limited functionality but maximum mobility. He sees Netbooks as part of a larger ecosystem of devices that allow people to access their data everywhere, part of the “always-on” computing concept.

Wouldn’t it be nice if more people adopted this attitude?