I should have waited a day before writing yesterday's blog as I could have added this breaking story. Today, Konica Minolta, the third largest manufacturer of cameras, announced it is leaving the camera and film business altogether. It will stop producing both digital and film cameras by March of this year and will stop making photographic film and color paper by March 2007, pulling out of a market in rapid decline due to the spread of digital cameras, which store images digitally.
But wait, there is more. Konica Minolta also said that it will sell a portion of its digital single lens reflex (SLR) camera assets to Sony for an undisclosed sum. Last July, Sony and Konica Minolta formed an agreement to jointly develop digital SLR cameras, which are generally more expensive and offer better performance than point-and-shoot compact models, and typically use interchangeable lenses. The company said it will continue to produce digital SLR camera bodies and lenses for Sony based on its Maxxum/Dynax mount system, meaning that current owners of those lenses will be able to use them on new digital SLR models to be developed by Sony.
Sony already makes several non-SLR digital cameras so there was no need for the company to buy the non-SLR portion of the Konica Minolta business. Currently Konica Minolta only makes one digital SLR camera, but it is a very good one. Sad to say the Konica Minolta brand will disappear, ending a legacy that started when Minolta started producing cameras in 1928.
Regarding the film side of their operation, the company was the world's third-largest maker of camera film after Eastman Kodak and Fuji Photo Film and had said in November that it would significantly downsize its loss-making camera and film operations, but not completely shut them down. Today, they reversed that decision. Immediately following this announcement, Fuji Photo issued a press release saying it will continue making traditional camera film.
Konica Minolta, created in August 2003 through the merger of Konica and Minolta, has a long history in the camera and film markets, producing Japan's first photographic paper in 1903 and the country's first color film in 1940.
What's next, I wonder?
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