April 4 (Bloomberg) -- Hewlett-Packard Co., the world's second-largest personal-computer seller, projects its Asian PC sales to climb as much as 20 percent this year, aided by China, where it expects to grab share from rival Lenovo Group Ltd.

``We're aggressively going after the big competition in China -- Lenovo,'' Joergen Jakobsen, vice president of business PC, personal systems group in Asia, said in an interview in Singapore yesterday. ``We want to continue outgrowing the market and take market share.''

Hewlett-Packard, based in Palo Alto, California, expects its PC sales in Asia to rise 15 percent to 20 percent this year, compared with an estimated 8 percent to 10 percent for the industry, said Jakobsen, 40.

The company and rivals such as Dell Inc., the world's biggest PC maker, are courting customers in Asia, where Lenovo is the market leader. A drop in computer prices and expanding economies are spurring Asian demand, helping Hewlett-Packard's sales of personal computers in the region rise 14 percent in the first quarter ended January.

``It's good that H-P has its sights on Lenovo,'' Bryan Ma, a Singapore-based associate director at researcher IDC, said today. ``But H-P has to also watch for the threat from Dell.''

Hewlett-Packard had a 10 percent share of the Asian PC market at the end of December, just ahead of Dell's 9.9 percent, Ma said. Lenovo had a share of 17.6 percent, he said.

China `Critical'

China, the world's fourth-largest economy, is ``critical'' in the race to be No. 1 in Asia, Jakobsen said. ``We're going to overtake Founder, Great Wall and Dell'' within two to three years, he said.

Hewlett-Packard competes with Lenovo, the world's third- biggest personal-computer maker, Tsinghua Tongfang Co., Great Wall Technology Co., Founder Technology Group Corp. and Dell for PC sales in China.

Lenovo, based in Purchase, New York, in February started selling its own-branded computers outside China to gain market share, the first time since buying International Business Machines Corp.'s PC unit in May 2005.

Shares of Lenovo were unchanged at HK$3 as of 11:24 a.m. in Hong Kong. Great Wall's stock fell 1.2 percent to HK$1.60, and Founder Holdings, which distributes computers made by Founder Technology, slipped 1 percent to 49.5 HK cents.

Founder Technology's shares traded in Shanghai gained 0.6 percent to 3.24 yuan. Tsinghua Tongfang's stock rose 1.3 percent to 8.33 yuan.

More Sales

Hewlett-Packard's sales in China increased 45 percent for the three months ended January, Jakobsen said.

The company had a market share in China of 6.4 percent at the end of 2005, and targets gaining about 3 percentage points within two to three years, Jakobsen said. Hewlett-Packard, which has offices and distributors in 200 cities in China, expects to double the number of cities to 400 in the period, he said.

Hewlett-Packard plans to expand production at its existing factories in Asia to cater to rising demand, Jakobsen said. The company has five factories in the region, including China, India, Japan, Australia and Singapore.

To contact the reporter on this story: Andrea Tan in Singapore at atan17@bloomberg.net

Last Updated: April 3, 2006 23:48 EDT