Technology Incubation – Early Stage Product Manager

About the role

This role sits at the core of Lenovo CTO Org’s Tech Incubation team, driving end-to-end incubation for early-stage product concepts. You will take opportunities that have initial validation and turn them into real products: shaping MVPs, orchestrating pilots with customers and business units, and managing the path from 0 to 1.

Responsibilities

• Market Commercial Validation
• Assess market opportunities for emerging technologies and early product ideas, identifying high potential applications, customer segments, and pain points.
• Analyze trends, market size, and growth potential to prioritize where incubation effort will have the highest impact.
• Map the value chain and competitive landscape, including existing and emerging players, investment trends, and potential disruptors.
• Evaluate business models, pricing approaches, and unit economics to test commercial viability early.
• Build clear, concise business cases that link customer value, differentiation, and financial outcomes to support investment and scale-up decisions.
• Technology Differentiation
• Evaluate technology differentiation for incubation projects, articulating why Lenovo’s approach can win versus alternatives.
• Identify opportunities for platform leverage, technology partnerships, and ecosystem collaboration (e.g., ISVs, cloud, hardware partners) that accelerate time-to-market.
• Analyze competing and adjacent solutions, providing insights into where we should compete, partner, or integrate.
• Synthesize findings into clear recommendations and narratives for Lenovo Research leadership and corporate executives, influencing RD investment, partnership, and product strategy.
• Incubation Pilot Execution
• Translate validated opportunities and problem statements into clear product requirements and MVP definitions.
• Design and drive pilot programs with internal and external customers, from scoping and success-metric definition to execution and post-mortem.
• Build and manage cross-functional execution plans across RD, engineering, business units, and partners to hit pilot milestones on time.
• Collect qualitative and quantitative feedback from pilots, synthesize insights, and turn them into product decisions (iterate, pivot, or stop).
• Define the path from MVP to scale (productization options, handoff models, resourcing needs) and document clear go/no-go recommendations.

Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree in Computer Science, Engineering, Business, or related field.
• 8+ years of experience in product management, incubation, venture-building, or technology strategy within innovation-driven industries.
• Proven experience taking products from concept to MVP and pilot, including customer discovery, requirement definition, execution planning, and early go-to-market hypothesis development.
• Ability to operate in highly ambiguous, early-stage environments, structuring complex problems into clear roadmaps, milestones, and measurable outcomes.
• Strong commercial and analytical capabilities, including market sizing, competitive landscape evaluation, business model assessment, and unit economics analysis.
• Demonstrated experience building business cases and translating technical concepts into actionable product decisions and executive-level narratives.
• Experience collaborating cross-functionally with RD, engineering, finance, business units, and executive stakeholders.
• Strong communication and storytelling skills, with the ability to influence senior leadership and drive alignment.
• Proficiency in financial modeling and commercialization feasibility analysis.

Preferred Qualifications

• MBA or equivalent experience preferred.
• Experience in corporate strategy, venture capital, startup environments, or corporate incubation functions is a plus.
• Familiarity with AI, Edge AI, computer vision, advanced computing, or emerging technologies is highly desirable.
• Fluency in Mandarin is preferred.