Lenovo is set to open a US plant in 2013

PC BUILDER Lenovo will open a computer manufacturing plant in the United States next year to produce its Thinkpad Tablet 2.

Lenovo, which is seemingly on track to usurp HP as the top PC maker, will make the radical move of opening up a plant in the United States. The firm said it will build a 240,000 square foot plant in Whitsell, North Carolina to churn out desktops and tablets.

While companies such as Apple are taking flak for not cutting back on their profit margins and bringing manufacturing back to the United States, it is Lenovo, a Chinese outfit, that has announced a new plant that will bring 115 jobs to the US. Lenovo said its new plant is under construction and will open in early 2013.

Not surprisingly local and state officials were keen to talk up Lenovo's investment, and Senator Richard Burr said, "The trend lately has been for manufacturing jobs to be created abroad, but some of the brightest and best trained talent in these high-tech fields can be found right here in America. I am proud of Lenovo for recognizing the talent and the potential here in North Carolina, and I look forward to even more growth in this sector in the years to come."

Lenovo has recently expanded its manufacturing facilities in Brazil and China but it is the firm's investment in the US that could make other firms look again at the economics of using American labour rather than losing sleep over negative press coming out of Foxconn's factories. µ