MSI vehemently denies Lenovo buyout rumor

It’s official: MSI has thoroughly batted down rumors that PC maker Lenovo is in talks to buy the smaller company’s gaming laptop division.

“In regards to the rumors circulating about (a) Lenovo and MSI acquisition, MSI is not in talks with Lenovo to sell the MSI Gaming Notebook business,” MSI’s president Andy Tung said in a statement released to the press.

Rumors began swirling ’round the Internet last Friday, when Taiwan-based news site DigiTimes reported that undisclosed sources had told it MSI was in talks with Lenovo for a buyout. Lenovo would be looking to buff its gaming laptop division, and MSI would sell its laptop division because of increased competition from other OEMs.

PCWorld’s questions to Lenovo went unanswered, but MSI was clear in its message. The company went so far as to say it’s looking for the source of the rumors and could sue them.

“We are currently seeking the source of this false information and reserve the right to take any legal action,” Tung said.

Why this matters: Micro-Star International is well known to consumers for its components such as motherboards and graphics card, but in the last few years it’s made a name for itself for competitively priced and ambitious gaming laptops. Fewer laptop vendors means less consumer choice and innovation, but MSI hasn’t been afraid to innovate. At CES, the company introduced a model with a mechanical keyboard as well an external dock for a discrete graphics card. 

The unanswered question is whether Lenovo is truly on the hunt to gobble up a competing vendor with a more established reputation among gamers. Lenovo has had moderate success with gaming laptops and is known for offering a good bang for the buck, but it doesn’t have the reputation among gamers that Dell does with Alienware and Asus has with its Republic of Gamers laptops.