When Lenovo Group Ltd. acquired the personal computer business from IBM Corp. in 2004, some skeptics questioned the venture’s future success. Yet the company managed to expand the business to a position as the world’s largest supplier of PCs by 2013.

Lenovo is at it again. On Thursday, the company announced plans to partner with NetApp Inc. in launching a range of storage products, and creating a joint venture to expand business in China.

“Overnight, they will be the No. 3 player in China, and they have a goal to be No. 1 there,” said Stu Miniman, co-host of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile livestreaming studio, during an analyst discussion of the Lenovo Transform 2.0 keynote in NYC. “History seems to be repeating itself.”

Miniman was joined at the conference by co-host Rebecca Knight and they discussed Lenovo’s recent moves in the storage market and how acquisitions and partnerships appear to be positioning the company for solid growth. (* Disclosure below.)

New investment as revenue increases

Thursday’s news from Lenovo’s New York City event emerged as the company recently posted its first double-digit revenue increase in 10 quarters and announced plans to invest $1.2 billion for artificial intelligence research and development initiatives in India.

“This is a company that’s really turning the corner,” Knight said. “We’re starting to see a lot of positive growth.”

Lenovo’s partnership with NetApp follows a familiar pattern where the company reaches out to either acquire or collaborate on key technology to make a quantum leap in the market. The company acquired Motorola Mobility from Google in 2014, which vaulted it to a position as the third-largest smartphone maker in the world, and bought IBM’s x86 server business in the same year.

“We’re starting to see the fruits of the Motorola Mobility and x86 server acquisitions,” said Miniman. “The whole data center piece and mobility go together, but you’ve got to have storage.”

Here’s the complete analysis, part of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of the Lenovo Transform 2.0 event. (* Disclosure: TheCUBE was a paid media partner for Lenovo Transform 2.0. Neither Lenovo, the event sponsor, nor other sponsors have editorial control over content on theCUBE or SiliconANGLE.)

Photo: Lenovo Transform 2.0