His high-tech Highness; Face value.(Face value: Quanta's Barry Lam)(Quanta Computer)(Brief Article)(Company Profile)

Economist (US), The, July, 2002

Barry Lam, boss of the world's biggest laptop maker, fancies his chances in storage and artificial intelligence

HOW best to describe Barry Lam, the founder, chairman and chief executive of Quanta Computer, the world's largest maker of laptop computers? "Confident," says an acquaintance at Taiwan's trade-development organisation, with a smirk that implies understatement.

And yet Mr Lam is hardly a household name. If you have not heard of him or of Quanta, that is because it suits him commercially to keep a low profile. If you own a Dell laptop, there is a ...