Lenovo ThinkPad Tablet to get Ice Cream Sandwich

Lenovo's ThinkPad Tablet will be updated to the most recent version of the Android operating system, known as Ice Cream Sandwich, within the next three months.

The update will begin to roll out globally in May, the company said in an announcement on Wednesday. A Lenovo spokeswoman told ZDNet UK that all new ThinkPad Tablets shipped from May onwards would come with Ice Cream Sandwich (ICS) pre-loaded.

The new version of the software will bring a revamped UI that uses different fonts, a redesigned contact list, new camera features, modifiable widgets and an updated notifications system.

The OS also introduces less run-of-the-mill features such as a facial recognition unlocking option, and the addition of an offline reading mode to the web browser. It also brings features such as Android Beam for transferring contacts, maps or app information between devices.

The Ice Cream Sandwich release is designed to bring together the different builds of Android that had previously been separately designed for smartphones and tablets.

In addition to announcing the upgrade schedule, on Thursday Lenovo released details of its third financial quarter of 2011 ending 31 December.

The company said that in the preceding three months it had increased profits by 54 percent, to $153m, in a year-on-year comparison. Total sales revenue for the quarter was $8.4bn.

The company largely attributed the gains to a strong performance in the laptop division, which generated 53 percent of its total sales revenue, showing a 30 percent rise in comparison to the same period in the previous year.

The desktop business also posted a strong performance with a 32 percent increase in unit shipments, attributing for 33 percent of the company's total sales revenue and bucking the industry decline of 3 percent, Lenovo said.

"Lenovo is now the number one provider of consumer desktop PCs in the world, and the third largest provider of commercial desktop PCs," the company said in a statement.