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Minolta Withdraws From Camera and Photo Business |
Konica Minolta Exits Camera and
Photo Business
Friday, January 19, 2006
It was bound to happen sooner or later in a crowded
market, but when it comes, it's still a surprise.
We are of course talking about the big news today
of Konica Minolta being the first of the
major camera manufacturers to withdraw from the
camera and photo business altogether.
Blaming the difficulty "to timely provide competitive
products even with our top optical, mechanical
and electronics technologies," they have announced
the following decisions:
- Transfer camera assets to Sony effective March
2006.
- Phase withdrawal from the photo business by
the end of March 2006 (Minilab), March 2007 (color
film and color paper) and September 2007 (all
photo sales activities).
- Reduce worldwide Konica Minolta Group employees
by 3,700 from the current 33,000 including early
retirement offering by September 30, 2007.
In the Camera Business, net sales for Fiscal
year ended March 31, 2005 was 117,000 million
yen (Forecast for fiscal year ending March 31,
2006 is 75,000 million yen), with an Operating
Loss of 7,300 million yen.
In the Photo Business, Net sales for Fiscal year
ended March 31, 2005 was 151,500 million yen (Forecast
for fiscal year ending March 31, 2006 is 110,000
million yen), with an Operating Loss of 1,400
million yen.
According to the press release, Konica Minolta
will be concentrating their business resources
on non-consumer businesses, such as the
core 'business technologies' field, the strategic
'optics and display devices' field, and the growth
expected 'medical imaging' and 'sensing' fields.
We're sure that, besides acquiring the camera
assets, Sony will also acquire some of the talented
personnel assets as well. This announcement sure
promotes Sony from being a "non-traditional"
camera manufacturer to a potential major player
in the dSLR field -- all depending on how they
execute in that all-important field. Sony now
also possesses one of the hottest CCD stabilization
technology available.
Links:
Read
the whole KonicaMinolta press release...
Partial
Transfer of Assets to Sony
Brief History
of Minolta Cameras
Best KonicaMinolta
Digital Cameras
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