Lenovo brings the Yoga Slim 7i Carbon to India, its lightest notebook yet

“It’s really about the materials that have gone into making the product,” Amit Doshi, Chief Marketing Officer, Lenovo India, tells Indianexpress.com in an interview on the sidelines of the launch of the Slim 7i Carbon in India. “So that really helps cut down the weight almost by about 40% versus an average laptop while it increases the durability and the rigidity by almost 25%.”

At 13.3 inches, the Slim 7i Carbon is outfitted with an 11th-gen Intel Core i7 Tiger Lake processor with Intel Iris Xe graphics. The notebook has three USB-C ports and a headphone jack. Available in just one configuration, Lenovo touts the Yoga Slim 7i Carbon has 15 hours of battery life on video playback. Like other premium notebooks in the Yoga range, the 7i Carbon’s, audio is powered by Dolby while the screen is Dolby Vision enabled.

Coronavirus has changed how people interact with technology. Sales of laptops are surging since the past year as people continue to work from home. Not just cheaper notebooks, the demand for high-end laptops has also increased.

“A laptop used to be something that would be on your desk, and then you would be on the move, either with a phone or a tablet but that’s not the case anymore,” he explained.

Technology research firm IDC estimated that in the fourth quarter of 2020 Lenovo represented 18.4 per cent of the Indian PC market. Globally, Lenovo remains the world’s largest PC maker by volume.

“In the last one year, the number of new customers who have come into the fold, whether it is business leaders and entrepreneurs who now need a device that meets their lifestyle and computing standards are very different,” Doshi said.

Lenovo is betting on premium laptops, which it sells under the Yoga range. “I find that most brands in the category are either Me too, or are caught up in the specs game and haven’t changed the level up to the experience game that luxury shoppers are today aiming for,” he said. For Doshi, the priority right now is to convince a customer to look beyond specifications and instead consider the experience they get from a high-end notebook.

Doshi stressed that Lenovo is experimenting with different material finishes to improve the design of its laptops. The Yoga 9i, for instance, has a classic design with its leather lid and elegant black finish. With the Yoga Slim 7i Carbon, Lenovo used an aero-grade carbon-fiber to keep the weight of the notebook under 1 kg.

“The usage of materials and being able to experiment and step out of the comfort zone is very important, he said.