Chinese IT giant Lenovo has become the latest potential suitor for ailing smartphone maker BlackBerry, The Wall Street Journal reports.

The report said that Lenovo is “actively considering” a bid, which would bolster its already increasingly strong position in the mobile market.

Unlike some other potential buyers, the company is expected to be looking at swallowing BlackBerry whole, rather than chopping it into parts.

But any deal is also likely to encounter some hurdles. Not least that BlackBerry is an incumbent supplier to the US government, with data sent travelling across the company’s secure network – something the authorities are unlikely to want to be controlled by the Chinese.

And a deal would also see scrutiny from the Canadian authorities, which have so far issued a “no comment” on the Lenovo speculation.

This is not the first time that Lenovo has been linked with BlackBerry – as far back as January, Lenovo was said to be eyeing the BlackBerry-maker, but then said that this had been extrapolated from a comment about its M&A strategy.

The Chinese company also held talks with ailing Japanese smartphone maker NEC, which did not come to fruition, and has also been suggested as a partner for HTC.

Lenovo is becoming an increasingly significant player in the mobile market, building on its strong position in China to move into other cost-sensitive markets such as Russia, India, Indonesia, Vietnam and Philippines.

An acquisition of BlackBerry would help it improve this worldwide, through the target’s existing relationships with operators and established distribution network.

In addition to which, through its acquisition of IBM’s PC business in 2005, Lenovo has a strong position in the enterprise computing market, which would fit well with BlackBerry’s focus on this market.

Earlier this week, Bloomberg reported that private equity firm Cerberus Capital Management had signed a nondisclosure agreement with BlackBerry, in order to assess a bid – a move that was somewhat expected.

Other mooted buyers have included Cisco, Google and SAP (although these players are believed to be looking at parts, rather than the whole), and BlackBerry founders Mike Lazaridis and Doug Fregin.

BlackBerry has already signed a $4.7 billion deal with Fairfax Financial, although there is growing scepticism that this will come to fruition.