Lenovo has previously shown off a prototype display that can intelligently align itself for optimal ergonomics. Now, it’s doing something similar with a laptop stand, too.
At the IFA 2025 show in Berlin, Lenovo is showing off what it’s calling the Smart Motion Concept, a smart multidirectional laptop stand that can track your face and optimize itself so that presumably its alignment will place little stress on your eyes and neck. The company is also showing off what it calls a “VertiFlex” concept, which would allow a laptop’s landscape screen to rotate into a portrait mode, and a “Magic Bay Tiko” smart screen.
Lenovo typically exposes some of what its engineers have been working on at various trade shows, hearkening back to the days when IBM — which sold its laptop business to Lenovo — would open the doors of its iconic Almaden Research Lab in the foothills of San Jose. There, IBM would show off some of its research, seeding the industry with new ideas while soliciting feedback.
At CES 2025 as well as the MWC 2025 show, Lenovo demonstrated the AI Display, which placed an NPU inside of a display both to add AI capabilities to older PCs, as well as to allow the monitor to automatically swivel, tilt, and elevate. The idea was that in a shared communal workplace, where workers might cycle in and out with laptops connected to docking stations, the AI Display could automatically configure itself to a new worker.
Before the work-from-home movement took over, however, communal workspaces were also jammed together with laptop stands, with their displays doubling as external monitors. The Smart Motion Concept basically does the same thing as the AI Monitor, aligning the laptop both to minimize eyestrain as well as to position it and its camera for video calls. Analyst Olivier Blanchard of the Futurum Group captured a video of the Smart Motion Concept in action, as it turned and followed him.
Olivier Blanchard / X
Lenovo also uses an AI ring to enable gesture controls of the entire setup, the company said.
It’s all very reminiscent of webcams like the OBSBOT Tiny 4K, which has a small gimbal and tracking software to allow the webcam to twist and turn and track your face as you move about the room.
Tweaking the display is also the theme of Lenovo’s other concepts.
The ThinkBook VertiFlex Concept (top image) imagines a traditional clamshell laptop whose 14-inch screen can be vertically rotated into portrait mode. The 3.06-pound laptop is designed to switch into portrait mode for use with reviewing documents or writing code. While in portrait mode, Lenovo said that it intends that a smartphone could connect to the laptop by lying with its back facing the portion of the display — though whether for charging or just ergonomics is unclear.
Lenovo
Lenovo also showed off what it calls a “NaturaSynth” display, with blue light being throttled down to under 1 percent to reduce eye strain and fatigue. The blue-light controls are managed in hardware, Lenovo said.
Finally, Lenovo also showed off (but didn’t announce) the Magic Bay Tiko concept, which is essentially another small display which can be attached to the back of your laptop. Lenovo is positioning the small rectangular display (about the size of an old car-mounted CD deck) as both a teleprompter and a second screen for speaker notes without your eyes drifting too far away from a webcam during a meeting.
Olivier Blanchard / X
Keep in mind while these are technically concepts, Lenovo also brings some of these to reality. The latest example? The ThinkBook Plus Rollable, a superb laptop with an extensible rollable screen that began life as a concept but which Lenovo eventually brought to market. Ironically, the Rollable essentially beats VertiFlex to market by “unrolling” into a portrait mode. Either way, it’s great to see companies trying new things — and talking about them publicly.