Chinese computer giant Lenovo has launched its first two tablet computers on the corporate and consumer markets in Thailand, with the aim of capturing the corporate market, where adoption of tablets is expected to be a huge trend in 2012.

Lenovo's ThinkPad tablet is aimed at corporate users, while its IdeaPad tablet K1 aims to attract consumers. Both of them use the Android 3.1 platform.

Lenovo (Thailand)'s country general manager Jeerawut Wongpimonporn said his company would focus more on the corporate segment because it was a virgin market for tablets, whereas there were many tablet vendors in the consumer segment. However, the consumer segment is bigger than the corporate segment, so Lenovo believes there is also room for success there.

Jeerawut said that to capture the corporate market, Lenovo would work with local software companies to develop corporate applications to serve ThinkPad users in corporate organisations.

"We will offer tablets with solutions to corporate customers in vertical segments, including banking, education, telecommunications and hospitality. We will also offer more than 1,000 applications at the Lenovo App Store that we have certified as being fit for Lenovo's tablet devices. This aims to help our customers to avoid wasting time seeking applications from more than 240,000 applications in the Android market," he said.

To approach corporate customers, the company will work through business partners, including distributors and system integrators as well as software developers, to provide tablets as a part of business solutions. For customer support, IBM and Value Systems will take care of the ThinkPad tablet family and the IdeaPad tablet family respectively.

The ThinkPad tablet combines security, reliability and manageability features. It is designed as a companion computing device for professionals on the go. The ThinkPad includes an optional digitizer pen, a full-sized USB port, a full-sized SD card slot, and a mini-HDMI for connecting to external projectors and displays, as well as an optional ThinkPad quality Keyboard Folio Case with optical TrackPoint.

Lenovo's 32GB IdeaPad tablet K1 Wi-Fi version will be available in Thailand for Bt16,990 later this month or in October. A 32GB IdeaPad tablet K1 with both Wi-Fi and 3G connectivity will be available in October. ThinkPad tablets with 64GB or 32GB of storage and both Wi-Fi and 3G connectivity will become available towards the end of this month, with pricing to be advised.