China's biggest PC maker Lenovo announced yesterday that its laptop business will focus on developing wide-screen products with the help of Mickey Mouse.

The company launched a series of wide-screen laptops, ranging from 12 to 15 inches, for its winter promotion, which started yesterday and will last until early February.

"We expect that wide-screen laptops will account for 50 percent of our sales in the Lenovo-branded laptop business after the winter promotion," Zhang Hui, vice-president of Lenovo Group, said yesterday at a press conference in Hong Kong.

Last November, Lenovo launched the world's first 13.1 inch wide-screen laptop. So far, wide-screen products have accounted for 23 percent of its laptop sales.

According to Zhang, "wide" is the growing trend for computer displays and many PC makers have rushed to launch new products. Market statistics show about 30 percent of consumers would choose wide-screen computers over standard-screens. And this proportion would increase to 80 percent if wide-screen products were priced the same as standard-screen computers.

Due to increasing demand for wide-screen products, Lenovo plans to develop its Tianyi series into a wide-screen product range.

To promote its wide-screen products, the PC maker yesterday also released the world's first laptop featuring the well-known Mickey Mouse image. Under the authorization of Disney Co, the company will sell a limited number of Mickey or Minnie-themed laptops, based on its Tianyi 100 model, in the Chinese mainland.

It can also use Mickey and other Disney cartoon images in its more than 3,000 outlets around China, to provide a more entertaining and enticing environment for consumers.

"The cooperation with Disney, like many others we have done before, will help improve the popularity of the Lenovo brand around the world," Zhang said.

After the acquisition of IBM's laptop business last December, the company has gone into cooperation with big international brands like Visa and Coca Cola as a marketing ploy. It is also the main sponsor of the 2008 Olympic Games. For its winter promotion programme, Lenovo has also gone into cooperation with Kodak.

It is widely believed that the acquisition of ThinkPad has provided a better platform for Lenovo to involve other influential companies in its marketing strategy, which will inevitably help Lenovo on its way to becoming a global brand.

(China Daily November 30, 2005)