????在這場斗雞博弈中，IBM似乎已心生退意。

????總部位于紐約州阿蒙可的IBM希望出售旗下x86低端服務器業務已經有一段時間了。去年初，它也曾與最可能的買家聯想進行過正兒八經的談判?？偛课挥诒本┑穆撓耄↙enovo）曾于2005年收購了IBM的PC業務。后來，可能達成交易的消息據稱被IBM泄露，消息稱這塊業務的售價將超過40億美元。但消息可能放早了：這個天價讓聯想望而卻步，轉身離去。

????上周四，這兩家公司宣布它們最終達成了交易。聯想將支付23億美元，收購IBM這塊年收入約46億美元的業務。約7,500名IBM員工將加入聯想。

????消息發布兩天前，IBM還在第四季度業績報告中表示，硬件業務的下滑速度超過預期。IBM決定與聯想簽署上述協議的時間可能是在這份業績報告之前，但顯然IBM清楚自己持有的這項資產只會逐年縮水。23億美元的價格固然大大低于IBM一年前的要價，但接受這個價格仍然是明智之舉。

????這項交易對于聯想及其投資者也有很大意義，交易消息將聯想美股的股價推高了3%多。近年來，這家中國公司在PC行業表現出色。約6個月前，它小幅超越惠普(Hewlett-Packard)，躍居行業第一。如今，整個PC市場正在經歷空前的滑坡，聯想也是全行業唯一一家保持業績穩健的大型PC公司。這家公司的成功源自多元化（包括產品和地域多元化）策略、規模效應以及超低的利潤率。哦，對了，還有完美的執行。

????正如《財富》雜志在去年的一份特寫報道中所指，聯想的最終目標是依托自己在PC行業的主導地位，挑戰蘋果(Apple)和三星(Samsung)在移動行業的地位。

????那么，這項交易對于聯想的這個目標有何推進呢？首先，它能顯著增強聯想在低端服務器領域的地位，并能在開發和制造領域能與PC業務產生極大的協同效應。收購IBM這塊業務后，聯想在企業數據中心服務器行業的排名將從第六升至第三?！拔覀兊臉I務將據此增長近10倍，”聯想高級副總裁彼得?霍騰休斯在一次電話會議上告訴記者們。

????第二，雖然低端服務器是IBM的低利潤率業務，但對于聯想仍屬于高利潤率，聯想總是將市場占有率置于比利潤更重要的地位，以低價與戴爾(Dell)和惠普展開競爭。

????總利潤率的提升能給這家中國公司一定的喘息空間，以增加對快速增長的、年輕的移動業務的投資。聯想進入智能手機行業是約略兩年多前，但依托它在中國和其他發展中市場的業務強勢，去年第三季度，聯想的智能手機銷量已位列全球第三。雖然聯想5.1%的全球市場份額仍遠落后于蘋果的12.1%和三星的32.1%，但這樣的表現仍然令人贊嘆。

????“我們對于這項收購倍感興奮，”霍騰休斯說?！斑@對于我們是符合邏輯的一步。”

????當前的主要問題是這項交易能否獲得監管部門的批準，包括可能還需要接受美國國家安全的評估。從以往經驗看，這筆交易很有可能獲得批準：不同于很多中國公司，聯想的運營透明度和開放度很大程度上是執行的西方標準。它已經向美國聯邦機構出售了數以萬計的PC，并多次獲準收購美國公司或美國公司的子公司。其中最值得一提的交易就是聯想于2005年收購IBM的PC業務，恰恰就是這項交易開啟了一家中國成功企業向全球巨頭的轉變之旅?；趄v休斯曾代表IBM進行了2005年收購交易的談判，并于此后加入了聯想。他表示，最新的這筆交易預計將在6-9個月內完成。（財富中文網）

????In this game of chicken, it looks like IBM blinked.

????The Armonk, N.Y.-based technology company (IBM) has wanted to unload its low-end, x86 server business for some time. Early last year, it conducted serious negotiations with the most likely buyer, Lenovo, the Beijing-based company that purchased its personal computer business in 2005. News of an impending deal, presumably leaked by IBM, suggested that the unit would fetchnorth of $4 billion. But it was premature: Lenovo balked at the steep price and walked away.

????On Thursday, the companies announced that they finally had a deal. Lenovo will pay $2.3 billion for IBM's business, which brings in approximately $4.6 billion in revenue annually. Some 7,500 IBM employees will join Lenovo.

????The news comes just two days after IBM said during its fourth-quarter earnings report that its hardware business was declining faster than expected. While the decision to seal the deal with Lenovo likely preceded the report, it's clear that IBM understood that it was holding on to an asset whose value would only decline over time. It wisely took the $2.3 billion, even though it was a much smaller sum than what it had asked a year earlier.

????The deal makes plenty of sense for Lenovo, too, as well as its investors, which sent the company's U.S. shares up by more than 3% on the news. The Chinese company has been killing it in the PC business for years. A little over six months ago, it became No. 1 in the industry, edging out Hewlett-Packard (HPQ). Lenovo is also the only major PC vendor that has managed to hold steady as the PC market experiences its worst declines in history. The company has staked its success on a strategy of diversification (in both product and geography), scale, and wafer-thin margins. Oh, and flawless execution.

????As Fortune explained in a feature story last year, Lenovo's ultimate goal is to leverage its dominant position in PCs to challenge Apple (AAPL) and Samsung in mobile.

????So how does this deal further those ambitions? First, it significantly strengthens Lenovo's position in low-end servers, a business that has a lot of synergies with PCs with regard to development and manufacturing. With IBM's unit, Lenovo will go from No. 6 to No. 3 in the business of selling servers to corporate data centers. "It grows our business by almost a factor of 10," Peter Hortensius, a senior vice president at Lenovo, said in a conference call with reporters.

????What's more, while low-end servers were a low-margin business for IBM, they represent a high-margin business for Lenovo, which has often prioritized market share over profits and undercut rivals like Dell and HP on price.

????A boost in overall profit margins could give the Chinese company the breathing room it needs to invest more heavily in its mobile business, which is still young but growing quickly. In the third quarter, Lenovo, which entered the smartphone market only a little more than two years ago, became the No. 3 seller worldwide, on the strength of its business in China and other developing markets. While Lenovo's 5.1% share of the global market remains far behind Apple's 12.1% share and Samsung's 32.1% share, the performance is impressive.

????"We're very excited by this acquisition," Hortensius said. "It's the logical next step for us."

????The major question now is whether the deal will clear regulatory approval, including a likely national security review. History suggests it will: Unlike many Chinese companies, Lenovo largely operates by Western standards of transparency and openness. It sells tens of thousands of PCs to federal agencies, and it has been cleared to buy American companies or units of American companies on multiple occasions. The most significant of those was Lenovo's 2005 acquisition of IBM's PC business, a deal that began the transformation of a successful Chinese company into a global powerhouse. Hortensius, who helped negotiate that deal on behalf of IBM and then joined Lenovo, said he expects the deal to close in six to nine months.