Microsoft To Have Love/Hate Relationship With New Lenovo Tablet

Lenovo announced Thursday that it expects to release the ThinkPad Tablet 2 when Microsoft MSFT releases Windows 8 in October. "Customers want a versatile device that fits their lifestyle and the many ways they use technology," said Dilip Bhatia, ThinkPad vice president and general manager, in a statement. Presumably to be priced similar to its competitors, the ThinkPad Tablet 2 will rival the Apple AAPL iPad and upcoming Microsoft Surface. In addition, the new 9.8 mm thick device will run on the Windows 8 operating system and come in both 3G and 4G models, according to Lenovo. Following release of the Surface, Microsoft will be both a partner and competitor of Lenovo. Investors may wonder if this seemingly controversial relationship will last. With few other operating systems as prevalent as Windows, Lenovo may be hard pressed to find a replacement for its tablets and computers. When Google GOOG closed its acquisition of Motorola Mobility in May, a similar set of conflicting relationships emerged. Google became both a competitor of and operating system provider for Android phone producers, including Samsung. Though Samsung continues to use the Android operating system, the ultimate outcome of the company's relationship with Google remains to be seen. Another existing relationship conflict has existed for years with large investment banks. The banks may be incentivized to hurt a company by selling its shares short in proprietary trading, while at the same time aiming to assist the company with financing transactions. Microsoft's venture into tablet production has already angered competitor and partner Acer. Further ventures into computing hardware would not likely appease Acer or Lenovo. The ensuing competition might both diminish hardware margins and damage existing partnerships, a potentially dire outcome for each company involved.

Disclosure: At the time of this writing, I did not own shares of any companies mentioned in this post.