Industry News: Olympus to sell imaging business by the end of the year

[joestopper]

I think 20Dave meant events like concerts, sporting events, social events, weddings, car shows, etc...And he is correct, those types of events have definitely fell through the floor. For people like me my video business is actually busier than ever...corporate customers and small businesses are accelerating their video and audio footprint to reach customer's who aren't willing to travel to their physical location, to send video messages to their employees, to complete their next video advertising project, etc.

Photography on the other hand seems to have fallen through the floor, and I'm turning down any photography project that involves more than 1 or two people in the same room at the same time (i.e. birthday parties, weddings, ceremonies, etc).

Agree. Thatmakes sense.

 

[SecureGSM]

I fear Nikon could be the next victim. This would be a real loss. We have both a big Nikon and Canon gear, so this would end the future of one of our investments. Plus, Nikon makes some good cameras. They are not as rugged as Canon's cameras on prosumer level as we found out the hard way, but e.g. Nikons D500 is a better camera than the (older, of course) 7D2 , as I learned from shooting side by side with comparable lenses. Hope Nikon survives.

+++ I fear Nikon could be the next victim.

This. But Pentax is likely to go first.

 

[justaCanonuser]

Here's a good read about Oly in Ming Thein's blog. Ming Thein is the guy who undermined the Canon hate in the internet by making Canon's color science with his 5DRS review a bit more popular (in the 35mm world he uses Nikon):
https://blog.mingthein.com/2020/06/25/the-beginning-of-the-end/#more-19938

 

[justaCanonuser]

+++ I fear Nikon could be the next victim.

This. But Pentax is likely to go first.

It depends on Ricoh's strategic plans what happens with Pentax. A sign for a decline could be the slow-down of new Pentax product releases already before the corona pandemics. On the other hand, Ricoh kept their own camera line alive so far, despite it always was a small niche.

 

[Kit.]

Don't forget, it is much easier to design a good M34 lens, since the lens elements are smaller. I also disagree with your general verdict. I am pretty sure you didn't use ALL of the many lenses made by Canon, so you can't say that. In particular in the L segment, some of Canon's lenses are really impressive performers (I have quite a collection of L glass, so I can say that).

Actually, it's much harder to design a good M34 lens with the same absolute aperture. That Olympus 12-100 lens is an f/8 equivalent lens (by absolute aperture). Personally, I wouldn't buy such a lens for a full frame camera.

 

[hollybush]

The company is preparing to sell only from inventory.
I wonder would that create a fire sale or create a shortage. I’ve a fair collection of Olympus glass but not the best camera. ... I’d be tempted by a discounted EM -1 II or III which would be a useful travel camera.

It may depend which country you are in. When they discontinued the film OM system, I had a fairly extensive system but was missing one key lens. Given the robustness of the gear, I decided to simply complete my system by getting that one lens. Unfortunately, Olympus had chosen to terminate their agreement with the distributor here in Australia at the same time (while commencing to sell non-OM photo stuff directly!).

For many months afterwards, that lens (the 90mm f/2 macro) was being sold new online by Olympus USA for bargain prices, but they would not ship to Australia. I never found one used here, either, although I once missed one by a couple of hours.

My advice, assuming you are not in Japan, would be to either move quickly on buying that last piece, or sell the lot as soon as you can.

 

[ScottyP]

Nikon already ceded much of its sensor development to Sony. That was the point they gave up and started to die.

 

[Mt Spokane Photography]

Canon like every other company is feeling Covid-19. Here is a slide from their current financial report with comments below. Their strategy continues to be pushing out new higher end cameras as opposed to entry level models. Initially, the new models will have higher prices, but if demand continues to drop once those initial sales are fulfilled, expect sharp drops in prices.

They want to get as many of the R series cameras out in users hands because it drives sales of the very profitable RF lenses. No one makes a RF compatible lens. Some are sold that mount, or have a adapted rear end. I think Canon likely built in some encryption into the RF protocol. The older EF protocol still works.

 

[Mt Spokane Photography]

Canon like every other company is feeling Covid-19. Here is a slide from their current financial report with comments below. Their strategy continues to be pushing out new higher end cameras as opposed to entry level models. Initially, the new models will have higher prices, but if demand continues to drop once those initial sales are fulfilled, expect sharp drops in prices.

They want to get as many of the R series cameras out in users hands because it drives sales of the very profitable RF lenses. No one makes a RF compatible lens. Some are sold that mount, or have a adapted rear end. I think Canon likely built in some encryption into the RF protocol. The older EF protocol still works.

Canon was also hit heavily in the printer sales area. Companies were closed, and obviously could not buy high end printers. Many companies will be struggling to survive, and Capital acquisition will be at a minimum.

 

[AlanF]

Nikon already ceded much of its sensor development to Sony. That was the point they gave up and started to die.

Maybe it was a lifeline buying the best available technology. Time will tell.

 

[mustafa]

I had Minolta, then Mamiya and then Olympus systems until I realised that only Canon had (a) good products and (b) a long-term future. That realisation must have saved me quite a lot of money over the years.

 

[justaCanonuser]

Actually, it's much harder to design a good M34 lens with the same absolute aperture. That Olympus 12-100 lens is an f/8 equivalent lens (by absolute aperture). Personally, I wouldn't buy such a lens for a full frame camera.

You are right, that's a good point. Olympus would have to double the speed of their lens to get it on the level of a good FF lens... Well, Canon obviously goes the opposite way with their new dark tele lenses. So to say, they M34ized their latest lenses after a start with very fast RF lenses. But I think it is a smart move, because now customers who are not willing to invest in fast, expensive and heavy glass have an alternative not coming from Sigma or Tamron. Plus, Canon really seems to trust the low-light performance of their new sensors. This hidden message is the most attractive one for me, in particular with an eye on the R6.

 

[justaCanonuser]

Nikon already ceded much of its sensor development to Sony. That was the point they gave up and started to die.

Hm, in 2018 they still had their own engineers who developed the design of the sensors then manufactured by Sony: https://petapixel.com/2018/07/17/yes-nikon-designs-its-own-sensors/
Did they change this strategy in the past two years? I can imagine that latest cost cutting could have change this game.

 

[tmc784]

Lucky I stick with Canon since I learn photography.

 

[Alino]

RIP for the inventor of the TTL system

 

[usern4cr]

RIP for the inventor of the TTL system

Olympus created the TTL system?
If so, it just adds to the long list of their innovations.
Too bad they up & died.

If I were heading up their company way back, I'd hope I would have seen that their (relatively) tiny sensor would be their undoing eventually, and at the very least also start making lenses for the FF market like Sigma, Tamron and all the others. Olympus made such magnificent lenses of high quality that they could have been the "L" quality FF lenses for affluent buyers on those systems.

 

[Sporgon]

RIP for the inventor of the TTL system

I think you're wrong there; Topcon were the first, early '60s, which wasn't very successful, rapidly followed by Pentax with their Spotmatic, which was hugely successful.

 

[melgross]

That’s announcement is meant to make things look good , but it misses a number of serious problems, such as management concealing fraud of $1.7 billion for ten years before finally getting caught. This put a major crimp in the company. They’ve never been the same. And since then, they’ve continued to be mismanaged.

JIP is no savior. TheY destroyed Sony/s Vaio line when they bought it. Now it’s just a few pieces of junk. I expect the same will happen here after a few years if this goes through. JIP itself was set up for a specific purpose, well two actually. One is to get around japans laws and customs where they aren’t allowed to close a division, or a company if that means losing jobs. There are circumstances where that’s allowed, but olympus couldn’t do it. JIP can, slowly but surely, and just keep what ever they want.

the second reason is to keep Japan’s IP out of foreign hands. They are practically paranoid about this, and it’s thought that the reason Gossen was “set up” was to get rid of him and his management team as they became more integrated with Renault.

 

[melgross]

+++ I fear Nikon could be the next victim.

This. But Pentax is likely to go first.

It’s hard to say, because ?Ricoh is a big company, and Oentax is very small. They could just keep it around without spending much. In fact, that what they’ve been doing. The last few lenses were just contract lenses branded for them.

 

[SecureGSM]

It’s hard to say, because ?Ricoh is a big company, and Oentax is very small. They could just keep it around without spending much. In fact, that what they’ve been doing. The last few lenses were just contract lenses branded for them.

it all makes sense, provided the shareholders are happy to keep taking losses instead of profits year after year after year.. and they are not... so something is gotta give...