Here is my vision on this case: Canon already had the 1Dx mark III ready and was testing when Sony brought their mirrorless A7 / A9 to the market. Lots and LOTS of pro's converted to Sony, thanks to Sony's proactive way of convincing professional photographers by organising events and taking the pro's to nice hotels and tropical test sites. Canon fell asleep, the past 10 years they simply increased the shutterspeed, ISO and thought they were good to go for another 4 years. How many people have made the switch to Sony, I guess around 15 - 25%. Canon is very clearly having a hard time keeping up with all technological inventions competitors come up with.
So, the 1Dx mark III was tested, ready for market, WTF do we do with it, the Japanese must have asked themselves. There were two options:
1. We bin it, we cannot afford to launch a noisy prehistoric product while competitors are kicking with mirrorless cameras with much better performance. If we launch this product Canon will be known as the brand that is not up-to-date and selling vintage camera's.
2. We launch it anyway and see what happens. It has costed a lot to upgrade the 1Dx mark II so why putting 4 years of work to waste?
I think it is a very very risky period for Canon. They cannot afford another mistake, bare in mind the 1D mark III focus issues. I have owned two of these garbage bins and it took me 1 year to finally get Canon to admit something was severely wrong in their AF system. If Canon launches the 1Dx mark III and something is wrong with it, it's over and out. There is no way they will be back in pro business (*) like they were a few years ago. If they DON'T launch the 1Dx III in 2020 most of the pro's will be using Sony by the time the Mirrorless Pro body is ready for market somewere around 2021.
* maybe Canon does not want to be no.1 anymore when it comes to pro cameras, since Research and Development is costing a fortune.
It would be much more profitable to focus on semi-pro and consumer series (i.e. 5D series) and simply do a little RND yourself, but mainly copy stuff from other brands and put it into the semi-pro series a few months later. Canon is still a well known A-brand and I am sure lots of people are willing to buy it, even if it's not the highest megapixel camera or the shutterspeed is 1 fps less.
So...
Canon is falling behind. They have quickly launched the Canon EOS R just to have a mirrorless body on the market.
The EOS R is the camera YouTubers have quite some complaints about. It's design is not even close to what the pro's need, it only has 1 card slot and it is not silent in burst mode. Just imagine screwing an EOS R on your 400mm 2.8. Looks like attaching a post-stamp to a ... well I don't know, but the body would look small and ridiculous.
And what about all those loyal Canon pro's that -year after year- have invested in EXTREMELY expensive L-series lenses?
Canon is clearly not interested in developing EF lenses anymore, and is putting the pedal to the metal on RF series.
Bought a nice 400mm 2.8 lately? Too bad, byebye 13k. These buckets of glass are going to become useless in 2 years.
Be sure to be ahead of the game when Canon is launching new RF products, chances are the prices of EF lenses will drop like crazy.
Is it all negative and doom here? No.
I am pretty sure Canon will come up with a nice mirrorless pro body somewere end 2020 begin 2021 (and I'm pretty sure it's gonna cost 5 - 6k too).
But every day they wait will make Canon users switch to other brands... Canon has to step up, launch a mirrorless pro body ASAP!
And when they do, they have to be sure they are not launching a product that is already using outdated technology, since Sony seems to come up with new (semi) pro bodies every year.
Canon needs to increase their interval on launching new pro bodies, and they need to come up with something good SOON! Also they need to listen to their European and American users, WE HAVE BIGGER HANDS AND FINGERS HERE GUYS! So bigger grip please.. and dont put all them buttons on a square inch.
And last but not least, Canon needs to compete in pro gear pricing. The pricing has been ridiculous for the past decades, due to their monopolist status, but those times are over. And we have to thank Sony for that. So I never thought I would say this, but "thank you Sony."
Please Canon, make us (pro photographers using Canon) leading again AND charge reasonable prices.
And we'll be good to go for another decade. Focus on Photography, who needs 6K video and all that. Save that for C-series.
What we need is:
RELIABILITY, HIGH SHUTTER SPEED, WIFI, HIGH ISO PERFORMANCE, IMAGE QUALITY, FLAWLESS AUTOFOCUS, SHARPNESS, SILENCE.
Mr. Imo