I received this email from an IBM staffer, forwarded from the CEO of Lenovo (see below). This is hard to believe. It seems likely the laptop case had a lot to do with this tale of survival -- my thesis adviser had a similar, slightly less horrific, accident and her Mac PowerBook was completely destroyed.

Dear Manager:

All of us passionately believe in the quality and durability of Lenovo products, and that is why we've been evangelists for our best-engineered PCs around the world. But more gratifying than spreading the word ourselves is hearing directly from users about how our products continue performing, even under extreme conditions. This is always a source of energy and excitement for me.

Recently, I received a particularly powerful customer letter telling one of these incredible stories -- that of a U.S. graduate student using a ThinkPad to write her thesis, who survived a horrific auto accident uninjured along with her PC. It's a story with a happy ending and one that provides real-world proof of Lenovo's leadership in product quality and durability.

An excerpted version of this customer letter is below for your reference. Each of us should be very proud of her positive experience. I encourage you to read the letter and share the story with your teams, as well as family, friends, customers and other business contacts.

Lenovo makes the world's best-engineered PCs -- there's no doubt about it!

Regards,

Bill Amelio
President and CEO
Lenovo

____________________________________________________________


Lenovo Corporation
Customer Satisfaction
ThinkPad Place
Morrisville. NC.

Dear Mr. Amelio.

I am a graduate student at Harvard University. A friend of mine let me borrow her IBM ThinkPad 600X, so that I could use it in order to write my Master’s Thesis. On September 13^th, 2007, after visiting my mother in Maine, I zipped up the ThinkPad into its carrying case, loaded it into the back of my 1998 Subaru Legacy Outback, and headed for Harvard. While traveling southbound on Interstate 95 near Hampton Falls, New Hampshire, my car was struck by a man suffering a diabetic seizure. State Troopers estimate that this man’s car was traveling 85-90 miles per hour. I don’t remember the details of the crash, but the police later informed me that my car rolled front to rear several times, struck a tree fourteen feet in the air and then crashed back to the ground upside down.

At some point during the incident, the ThinkPad was ejected from the car. While at the crash site, but several minutes after the crash, I distinctly remember that the people in attendance asked me what things I wanted to take with me in the ambulance. I mentioned the PC and at least two people said that retrieving it would not be possible since the car “was on top of it”. However, one of these “angels” in attendance managed to dig it out and the PC, along with other belongings, traveled with me to the hospital. I miraculously survived the crash with only slight injuries. My car was completely destroyed. As for the ThinkPad, I was curious and concerned to discover what had happened to the PC on which my thesis was stored.

The friend who lent me the ThinkPad picked me up from the hospital and drove me to her home in Massachusetts. I took the ThinkPad out of its dirty carrying case. I plugged it into a kitchen wall socket, and pressed the power button. We heard the familiar whizzing and beeping as the POST ran, the hard drive engaged and the software loaded. The ThinkPad booted flawlessly, without a single error! In awe and near disbelief, I then ran Microsoft Word and opened my thesis document. My year-long efforts towards my thesis displayed intact and without any problems or data loss whatsoever.

Therefore, I am writing to express my deepest gratitude for building such a champion Personal Computer! When I travel. I treat my ThinkPad with gentle care. To have it tossed around in my car like a popcorn kernel in hot oil, and then to witness it boot without a single error really impressed me. Please accept my sincere congratulations and thanks for building such an outstandingly durable and carefully engineered product as the Lenovo ThinkPad 600X.

As I mentioned before, I do not remember many details of the accident. Should you wish to corroborate any of the details of the crash I can provide you with the names of the Hampshire State Trooper, the ambulance crew of the Exeter Fire Department or my friend who lent me her computer. They could all testify to the truth of this description.

Again, my gratitude goes to you for engineering such an excellent and outstanding PC! Based on my experience with the Lenovo ThinkPad, I would surely purchase another Lenovo Personal Computer, and I would recommend that others make the same investment. One cannot always foresee what will happen to ones laptop!