Lenovo’s Comment On Sino-U.S. Trade War Sparks Anger Across Chinese Social Media

Chinese multinational technology firm Lenovo stated that it can shift production to other countries if the U.S. slaps additional tariffs on China.

Since the news of Lenovo’s response to CNBC was published, Chinese netizens on Weibo, China’s twitter-like platform, have responded with rage and mockery, accusing Lenovo of “admitting that it was never a true Chinese multinational company.”

“No more two-face. That’s great,” said the comment that got the most likes.

Lenovo CFO Wai Ming Wong told CNBC that it is well-prepared to deal with US President Donald Trump’s threats of adding an additional round of tariffs on $300 billion of Chinese imports which could include consumer electronics.

“We have definitely the ability to shift some of the production… from the impacted countries like China to the countries where we can continue to without, I think, without having the impact of the tariffs,” Wang told the CNBC interviewer.

The global personal computer manufacturer posted better-than-expected quarterly results in the third quarter of 2018. It recorded a total revenue increase of 8.5 percent to $14.04 billion, and a 12 percent rise of revenue to a record $10.7 billion for its PC and smart devices group.

Although global PC shipments fell in the fourth quarter of 2018, Lenovo ranked first according to research firm IDC with shipments of 16.8 million PCs. This was an increase of 1.3 percent from a year earlier, and represented 24.6 percent of the global market, IDC said.

“We obviously are well-prepared in the event that it [extra tariffs] happens,” said Lenovo’s chief financial officer.

“We obviously are well-prepared in the event that it [extra tariffs] happens,” said Lenovo’s chief financial officer.

Wong issued an official apology a day after the news to clarify his misuse of words and the misinterpretation that have resulted.

“Even if individual regional policies may affect us, we can still rely on China’s intellectual creation as a foundation to address possible problems by arranging global industrial chains,” Wong explained in his apology statement.

Featured photo credit to Lenovo