The three major PC giants are accelerating their move out of the mainland

The Trump administration of the United States has been ruthless in its tariffs against mainland China. The world's three largest laptop brands, Lenovo, HP, and Dell, have stepped up their production strategies outside the mainland, with the transfer to Southeast Asia becoming their main focus. As Apple continues to relocate its production bases, OEMs such as Quanta (2382), Wistron (3231), Compal (2324), and Inventec (2356) are actively strengthening their Southeast Asian layout in response to customer demand. Among them, Quanta's new production capacity in Vietnam will be added to production this year, and Wistron will also expand its investment in Vietnam's laptop production capacity. Inventec recently decided to expand its laptop production capacity in Thailand, and Compal will continue to build non-mainland production capacity in Vietnam, and the OEM factory's Southeast Asian PC chain layout is gradually taking shape. Seeing the demographic dividend in India and the local push for "Made in India", Lenovo, the leading PC brand, has decided to expand its production capacity in India. Currently, about 30% of Lenovo's PC sales in India are locally produced, and the goal is to increase the proportion to 50% next year. In the next three years, all PC products manufactured in India will be 100% supplied to the local Indian market. HP asked its foundries to accelerate their "de-China" layout last year, and it was reported that the goal was to move more than half of PC production out of the mainland and turn to investment in Thailand. Dell was named as having drawn up a full set of "de-China" scripts as early as 2023, and the first step was to stop using mainland-made chips. During the campaign at the end of last year, Trump threatened to impose tariffs on imported products from the mainland. At that time, rumors were rampant that major manufacturers including HP and Dell hoped that suppliers would accelerate their withdrawal from the mainland. Industry insiders believe that Lenovo's call to expand its production layout outside the mainland is of indicative significance to the PC industry chain, and it also means that the trend of de-China in the PC chain can no longer be reversed. The latest report from research firm Omdia pointed out that in 2025, PC brand manufacturers such as Lenovo, HP, Dell and Apple will expand the proportion of production in Southeast Asia, of which Dell and HP will increase to 25%.