If there is trouble behind the scenes of the sale of IBM’s X86 server biz to Lenovo, no one’s admitting it. Lenovo CEO Yang Yuanqing told reporters Wednesday that there is “no change to the plan” which called for the deal to be done by year’s end, pending the approval processes in China and the U.S.
Yang spoke at a news conference after Lenovo’s shareholder meeting in Hong Kong, according to the Wall Street Journal (registration required.)
The Journal reported last week that the $2.3 billion server deal, announced in January, could be running into headwinds because of U.S. concerns that Chinese hackers could remotely access IBM servers — many of which run in U.S. government agencies.
Given all the Edward Snowden disclosures about NSA snooping on foreign nationals, it’s also clear that Chinese authorities and businesses have their own concerns about U.S.-bred technology.
Lenovo’s chief also said the company’s planned $2.91 billion purchase of Motorola’s mobility group from Google should also close as planned this year. He would not comment on regulatory matters but downplayed any concerns about security. Lenovo is used to this process. It bought IBM’s PC and laptop business in 2005 and faced similar questions then.
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