Lenovo sells its products in around 160 countries. Lenovo's principal facilities are in Beijing and Morrisville, with research centers in Beijing, Shanghai, Shenzhen, Xiamen, Chengdu, Nanjing, and Wuhan in China, Yamato in Kanagawa Prefecture, Japan, and Morrisville in the U.S. It also has a joint venture with NEC, Lenovo NEC Holdings, which produces personal computers for the Japanese market. Lenovo was founded in Beijing in November 1984 as Legend and was incorporated in Hong Kong in 1988. Lenovo acquired IBM's personal computer business in 2005 and agreed to acquire its Intel-based server business in 2014. Lenovo entered the smartphone market in
Lenovo on carriers to sell its phones, its phones lacked strong branding and unique features to distinguish them in the competitive Chinese market where a weak economy and saturated market is slowing demand and the culture clash between a more hierarchical PC company and the need to be nimble to sell rapidly-evolving smartphones. In response to the weak sales, Lenovo announced in August 2015 that it would lay off 3,200 employees, mostly in its Motorola smartphone business. In the reorganization which followed, Lenovo was uncertain how to brand its Motorola smartphones. In November 2015, members of Lenovo management made statements that