Konica-Minolta withdrawing from Photo Business
In a totally sad but expected development, long-time photography equipment maker Konica Minolta announced recently that it’s company is withdrawing from the photo business come the end of March 2005 to concentrate more on “other profitable” business ventures.
Although the company is known for it’s excellent optics and electronics, the company, which was founded in the early 1900, does not develpop it’s own image sensors. This fact made it difficult for the company to compete in a market where all the leading market players have put in resources in the development of it’s own image sensors.
In 2005, Konica-Minolta and Sony went into a join-venture for the development of digital SLRs that would use Sony’s CCD and CMOS sensors and Konica-Minolta’s optics and Dynax lens mount systems. However, Konica-Minolta decided recenlty to withdraw from the agreement and transfer all of their assets relating to digital cameras to Sony. The multi-media giant is now in the midst of an accelerated development project to produce DSLRs based on Konica-Minolta’s Dynax lens mount system.
As for support, Sony would become provide customer service support for Konica-Minolta camera users, and for related products manufactured by Konica-Minolta.
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