Total smartphone volume declined 18.1 percent year-over-year with 20.2 million units sold. Outside of China, Lenovo saw a 15 percent growth rate year-over-year, driven by Emerging Markets outside of China. Lenovo saw hypergrowth in smartphone shipments in India and Indonesia, which were up 206 and 318 percent, respectively. Last quarter, 75 percent of volume was outside China; this quarter it increased to 83 percent. Also, Motorola saw shipments jump 25 percent quarter-to-quarter, showing further stabilization. In China, Lenovo’s restructuring has begun to pay off. And a new solid dual-brand strategy – with two main brands Lenovo Moto and Lenovo Vibe -- is set driving consistency and efficiencies for the smartphone business.
In the Enterprise Business Group, or EBG, which includes servers, storage, software and services sold under both the ThinkServer and System x brands, sales were US$1.3 billion, up 8 percent year-over-year and 12 percent quarter-to-quarter. System x had approximately US$1 billion in sales. Reported PTI – which included non-cash, M&A-related accounting charges – was negative US$14 million, improving both annually and sequentially. EBG was operationally profitable in the quarter. Moreover, it has delivered improving revenues and operational pre-tax income each quarter since System x was acquired.
This performance was driven by hyperscale wins in China. EBG stabilized its traditional data center-focused business, while attacking fast growing cloud, hyperscale and hyperconverged opportunities. On the partnership front, promising new partnerships with software and hyper converged players – Nutanix, Red Hat and, just recently, SAP – differentiate Lenovo’s offerings and strengthen its competitiveness. Lenovo remains on track to achieve its US$5 billion target for the Enterprise business in the 2015-16 fiscal year, on a constant currency basis.
Geographic Overview
In China, consolidated sales in the third fiscal quarter, declined 14 percent year-over-year to US$3.5 billion, accounting for 27 percent of the Company’s worldwide sales. Pre-tax income margin fell 1 point to 4.7 percent year-over-year.
In PCs, China saw record 40 percent market share. In Mobile, actions were taken to improve channel performance. With the new dual-brand strategy and a better product portfolio, mobile performance is improving. Enterprise revenue grew 30 percent from strong ThinkServer shipments to hyperscale customers Baidu, Alibaba and Tencent, allowing Lenovo to maintain its number one position in the China x86 server market.
In the Asia Pacific region, Lenovo achieved sales across the region of nearly US$2 billion or 15 percent of Lenovo’s worldwide sales, while operating margins were down 4.4 points to 1.0 percent year-over-year, mainly due to the contraction in the Japan PC market and impacts from currency fluctuation.
In PCs, Lenovo kept its #1 position with 18.9 percent market share, up 2.8 points year-over-year. This performance was driven by India which grew 55 percent year-over-year. Mobile saw strong smartphone shipment growth of 123 percent across the region, driven by strong momentum in India, and Indonesia, which grew by 206 percent and 318 percent, respectively. Finally, the Enterprise business grew share and improved profitability.
Lenovo in Europe, Middle East & Africa had consolidated sales in the third quarter of US$3.5 billion, a year-over-year decrease of 15 percent, hit by foreign exchange moves and a soft PC market. EMEA accounted for 27 percent of Lenovo’s total worldwide sales. Pre-tax income margin was 1.7 percent, a 1.3 point decrease year-over-year.
Lenovo maintained its #2 position in the PC market regionally, with 19.4 percent share. In consumer PCs, it was #1 for the eighth straight quarter. In Mobile, Lenovo had a record 4.7 million shipments, up 48 percent year-over-year. In Enterprise, Lenovo invested resources to continue to stabilize the top line.
In the Americas, Lenovo saw consolidated sales fall 7 percent year-over-year to approximately US$3.9 billion in the third quarter. This represented 31 percent of Lenovo’s total worldwide sales. Operating profit in the region was US$76 million, versus a loss of US$22 million recorded in the same period last year. Operating profit margin was 1.9 percent. The improved performance was a result of recent overall business realignment and restructuring actions in Brazil and Latin America.
Regionally, PC market share increased by 1.9 percentage points from a year ago to 13.1 percent, according to preliminary industry estimates. The solid performance was driven by the strong growth in the critical US PC market, where shipments grew by 21 percent year-over-year against a market decline of 4 percent. This brought Lenovo’s U.S. market share to 12.5 percent, up 2.6 percentage points year-over-year. In mobile, new Motorola phones drove a strong 52 percent increase in quarter-to-quarter shipments in North America, while some hyperscale opportunities generated good results for Enterprise.
* see IDC data 4Q 2015
** The Company provided financial breakdowns by product through the FY14/15 Q2 results announcement. After the Motorola and System x investments closed during Lenovo’s FY14/15 Q3, Lenovo began reporting by business group in order to aid understanding of the performance of these businesses.
About Lenovo
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