Lenovo is in talks to take a majority stake in Japan's biggest PC maker, a Japanese newspaper reported on Friday.
A deal between the Chinese company and NEC Personal Products is in its final stages, the Nikkei newspaper said.
"NEC has made no announcement on this and a decision has not been made," said Chris Shimizu, a spokesman for Tokyo-based NEC.
Any deal between the two could strengthen Lenovo's hand in the Japanese domestic PC market and give NEC a helping hand on the global stage.
Japanese PC makers dominate the country's domestic market and no company is bigger than NEC. In the first half of 2010 the company shipped 1.9 million PCs for a 20 percent share of the market, according to data from IDC.
NEC and its two biggest competitors, Fujitsu and Toshiba, accounted for half of all PCs shipped in the country during the period.
Lenovo accounted for 6 percent of the market, behind Dell, Hewlett-Packard and Sony.
On the global stage the situation is reversed and Lenovo easily beats NEC, which has largely withdrawn from selling PCs overseas. Lenovo shipped 9.2 million PCs in the third quarter of this year for a 10 percent share of the market, according to IDC data.
Martyn Williams covers Japan and general technology breaking news for The IDG News Service. Follow Martyn on Twitter at @martyn_williams. Martyn's e-mail address is martyn_williams@idg.com