December 2013

Mid-tier camera makers facing hard times
Reuters reports that Japanese mid-tier camera makers Panasonic, Fujifilm, and Olympus are struggling against the tide of camera-equipped smartphones. Compact camera sales are expected to fall more than 40% in 2013 compared to 2012, and the price of those compact had fallen so low that they hardly generated any profit anyway. The photography industry had elected mirror less cameras to catch on, as a way to create higher quality pictures than smartphones can take, but at a lower price than digital SLRs. Yet, mirrorless camera sales have been stalling as well. So for now, the digital camera market that was such a boon since its inception in the late 1990s is in a funk, with only Canon, Nikon and perhaps Sony standing a chance to prevail. [See article] -- Posted Monday, December 30, 2013 by chb