Lenovo Group is looking to invest about $30 million during the next year to build two manufacturing facilities in Mexico and India.
The Raleigh, N.C.-based PC vendor, best known for its enterprise line of ThinkPad laptops, tablets and desktops, announced July 25 that it will build the new facilities in Monterrey, Mexico, and Baddi, India.
The India facility is expected to open in the third quarter of this year, while the Mexico plant is scheduled to go online in the second half of 2008, the company said in a statement.
Officials with Lenovo, which IDC and Gartner ranked third in worldwide PC shipments in the second quarter of 2007, said the new plants will help as the company pushes into the SMB (small and midsize business) market and the consumer space with such products as its 3000 line of desktops and laptops.
The two plants, according to Lenovo, place the company closer to large SMB and consumer markets and allow it to better leverage the supply chain.
The announcement comes after Lenovo announced a round of job cuts in April that will save the company about $100 million during the current fiscal year.
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The 260,000-sqaure-foot Monterrey plant will have a production capacity of five million PCs and will employ about 750 people when it opens next year. It will be the companys largest manufacturing investment outside of China.
The Baddi plant will open with limited production in September. When it is fully up and running, the 130,000-sqaure-foot facility will produce up to two million PCs annually and employ about 350 people.
In addition to these two new plants, Lenovo has a number of facilities in China, including Beijing, Huiyang, Shanghai and Shenzhen. The company also has plants in Pondicherry, India, and a new center in Whitsett, N.C.
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