Lenovo Now World’s Biggest Maker of Portable PCs

I've not been on a market share "kick" lately. And I'm not implying it's more important than other metrics. I've always written about market share because it's one of the few things we can measure accurately. And it IS important. Not as important as curing cancer, which is about as relevant as the other weird non-market-share arguments made here. Move on. This is ridiculous.

This is in fact a great reason why market share matters. It has nothing to do with revenues/profits. Here's the thing: Would *I* rather be in Apple's position or Lenovo's? What's the difference. They're corporations, not people. We can't be in their position. As a user of PCs, Macs, or whatever devices, their respective profits and revenues don't matter to us in the slightest. In fact, one might argue that all Apple does with the profits it makes (beyond nothing) is develop new products that obsolete the ones we now own, and does so at incredible speeds. How does that benefit you? Developers look at market share and usage share to determine which platforms to support. Market share and usage share matter. Users look at what they see in the world--other people with products, advertising, reviews, whatever--and make their own decisions. None of that--none--has anything to do with profits or revenues. It's not that profits or revenues don't matter. It's just that some of you think it's all that matters. Again, that is not true.

"They're corporations, not people." Corporations are people my friend. Just a little post election humor ;) "Developers look at market share and usage share to determine which platforms to support. Market share and usage share matter." But nobody develops for Lenovo. They develop for Windows, or Mac OS. :) Either way, Developers will develop where they think they can be profitable. Usually this means where the most users are, but it is not a hard fast rule. OS X has more development than ever despite having a tiny marketshare compared to Windows. Windows Phone has much more development than its tiny marketshare would seem to indicate it would deserve. Android has the largest market share, but not the developer base and app selection that iOS has. Lenovo has 1/6 of the entire market, yet is just percentage points away from losing money. Despite massive market share growth, their profitability is not following at anywhere near the same rate, that is a bad sign. Yes they are selling more, but each unit is less profitable. Amazon is quickly amassing tablet marketshare, but as they have built that up, their profitability has turned into a loss. Profitability is more important than either revenue or market share. You can't survive long if you are not profitable, even if you have good market share and revenue. You can survive for ever with good profitability even if you have small market share and revenue. Any smart CEO would choose to have higher profitability over higher market share. I am not saying that market share and revenue are not important, but they are dwarfed in the end by profitability. Those who trade profitability for revenue and marketshare don't stay around too long. As to users, I am assuming this is a business article since it talks about earning and marketshare, neither matter to end users. Brand does, but that is not directly proportional to either profitability, market share or usage share.

Sadly, Chuck, Lenovo is profitable so comparisons to Palm or Commodore (which made the Amiga) are irrelevant.

"I've not been on a market share "kick" lately. And I'm not implying it's more important than other metrics." Really? You may want to have a conversation with the guy who wrote this: "And that's this: When it comes to PCs, tablets, smart phones, whatever; market share matters. In fact, it matters more than any other metric you care to name." - http://winsupersite.com/blog/supersite-blog-39/commentary/market-share-matters-140372 "I've always written about market share because it's one of the few things we can measure accurately." Are you claiming that its easier to measure market share more accurately than profitability and revenue? Because companies publish actual data about profitability and revenue, whereas market share is estimated by analysts. Are you also claiming that when comparing business metrics, curing cancer is just a relevant as profitability? Honestly, what is ridiculous is your response. It's fine to write about market share, but its only one metric that should be used, and its not the most important one. Its great that Lenovo has done well with their market share, but that is only part of the story. All I am saying is that simply touting growth in market share does not tell the whole story, whether its Lenovo, or Amazon, or Android, etc.

@slipslop I agree that most users don't care about these things. However, since this article is about market share and quarterly earnings, it appears to be directed towards the business side, not the user or technology side. Thus the discussion about profitability, revenue, share, etc.

Where does this article mention Apple? We use Lenovo business products at work. They're pretty solid. However, the consumer line we had in here (L series) were downright awful.