Lenovo built its own Amazon Echo for some reason

Lenovo is best known for its popular ThinkPad laptops and Yoga convertibles, and you may even remember that it makes smartphones too. But the Chinese company is branching out from notebooks, handsets and wearables with a push into smart home gadgets, starting with an Amazon Echo clone. The creatively named Lenovo Smart Assistant offers Alexa in a taller, rounder and more colorful speaker than the Echo, and starts at a cheaper $130, to boot. The new device is available in basic and premium flavors, with the latter offering Harman Kardon audio enhancements for $50 extra. I checked out prototypes of both models here at CES, but despite being impressed by the volume of the music it pumped out, I'm otherwise struggling to see its appeal.