Archive for April 17th, 2006
Digital refocuses photo industry
Old-guard camera, film makers losing out to high-tech
By Hans Greimel, Associated Press
April 17, 2006
TOKYO – They are some of the most legendary names in photography.
Minolta scored the world’s first successful auto-focus, single-lens reflex camera. Fuji invented 1,600- speed film, once the industry’s fastest. Nikon’s fabled F-series made the 35 mm camera the picture-taking workhorse for the past half-century.
Now the companies share a more dubious distinction: abandoning part of the business that made them famous.
Camera makers have battled to adapt to the digital revolution for the past 10 years, but recent retreats by leading brands underline how the industry has turned upside-down.
With interlopers such as Sony, Panasonic and Samsung capitalizing on their high-tech know-how, traditional camera makers and their black scrolls of film may soon join 19th century daguerreotypes as museum-shelf curios.
In just the past few years, digital cameras have catapulted from cutting-edge novelties to mainstream must-haves. But with the market poised to plateau, more players are chasing fewer opportunities, and the old guard is losing out.
“It’s inevitable that many of the camera manufacturers in the market today will be either bought up or go out of business,” said Ed Lee, an analyst with InfoTrends Inc., a U.S.-based market research group.
More than three-quarters of all cameras sold today are digital, and digital images are expected to account for 90 percent of all professionally taken photos by 2010, compared with 70 percent now, according to InfoTrends.
Camera buffs were stunned in January when Konica Minolta Holdings Inc., which traces its roots to 1873, said it was quitting the camera business altogether – digital and film – and selling its digital assets to rival Sony Corp.
Nikon Corp. said the same month it would stop making seven of its nine film cameras and concentrate on digital models.
Fuji Photo Film Co., which plans to cut 5,000 jobs, changed directions last month, announcing it would spend nearly $8.5 million to diversify into pharmaceuticals.
Europe’s biggest film maker, Germany’s AgfaPhoto GmbH, couldn’t adapt at all; it’s now bankrupt and liquidated.
Meanwhile, Antonio Perez, who is leading Eastman Kodak Co. through a four-year digital remake, has warned that Kodak, the pioneer of point-and-shoot photography, is now “at the worst possible place” after a $1.03 billion third-quarter loss.
Kodak, which is cutting up to 25,000 jobs, is the third-biggest digital camera maker worldwide, behind Canon and Sony. But Kodak was slow to shift its focus to digital, quitting the black-and-white paper business only last year.
Die-hard film fans in groups such as the Konica Minolta Photo Club mourn the passing of an era.
“Some members are very sad because they’ve been using Minolta for a long, long time,” club liaison Tadashi Hasegawa said.
Many of the big names in photography were once startups in their own right as they rushed to market in the 1950s with the advent of 35 mm cameras, undercutting and stealing market share from European makers.
Now they are the ones having difficulty adapting to the technology used in digital cameras: image processing chips and sensors called charge-coupled devices, or CCDs, which capture light and transform it into digital signals.
“In today’s era of digital cameras, where image sensor technology such as CCD, which we don’t have, is indispensable, it became difficult to timely provide competitive products,” Konica Minolta spokesman Minoru Ikehara said.
Some names, such as Kodak, Nikon and Olympus, farm out manufacturing of digital cameras to high-tech firms with expertise.
April 17th, 2006
Analog IC designers to benefit from digital camera sector’s expected 50% shipment growth in 2Q
Digi Times
With Taiwan’s digital camera makers expecting 50% in sequential shipment growth in the second quarter, their component suppliers from the analog IC sector, including Aimtron Technology, AME, and Advanced Analog Technology (AAT) will enjoy strong sales, according to industry sources.
Aimtron has received orders from Taiwan’s top digital camera maker Premier Image Technology for 6-channel PWM ICs, and shipments began in March, the sources said, adding that Aimtron will see demand for digital camera-use PWM ICs almost doubling in the second quarter.
Aimtron posted a sequential growth of 41% in revenues to NT$63 million for March, and the sources said that the company’s revenues for April should go up to NT$80 million.
AME has secured orders from Altek, and will start shipping the products in volume this month, the sources revealed.
With rising market shares in PWM ICs for digital cameras and other portable consumer electronics, AME recorded NT$67 million in revenues for March, and its revenues for April stand a good chance of hitting NT$80 million, the sources remarked.
AAT will also see its monthly revenues rise to an average of NT$80-100 million during the second quarter, up from a average of NT$65 million during the first quarter, due to strong demand from the digital camera and LCD TV sectors, the sources added.
April 17th, 2006
OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA
The Rensselaer Republican, IN
RENSSELAER — Kentland Bank will be honoring 25-year employee, Phyllis Britt, with a retirement open house for her past years of service. The open house will take place all day on April 21, and the community is invited to join Kentland Bank in honoring Phyllis Britt. Cake and punch will be served throughout the day.
“It has been a pleasure to work with Phyllis, and we will miss her dearly,†said Stan Haines, an employee of Kentland Bank.
Britt started at the bank in 1972 as a teller, when it was called Farmer’s National Bank. She was trained early on to start new accounts, order ATM cards, type loans up, take care of CDs and to create Christmas Club accounts.
“As a teller I was able to take care of just about [any] service the customer requested,†said Britt. â€What is really interesting is, back then, we all shared a single computer to do all the tasks.â€
SEE MORE OF THIS STORY IN THE MONDAY, APRIL 17 EDITION OF THE REPUBLICAN.
April 17th, 2006
Foreign firm to operate traffic digital cameras
Malay Mail, Malaysia
KUALA LUMPUR: Thinking out of the box, the Transport Ministry has come up with a way of ensuring the success of its planned digital camera system to catch speedsters.
It will leave the camera work to a company and pay it a commission for every person booked for traffic offences on highways, trunk roads and at major traffic junctions.
Which means it is in the interest of the company to detect every offender.
This way, the Ministry will achieve its goal of reducing the number of road accidents with- out having to spend money installing and maintaining the system. The company will bear the costs.
Transport Minister Datuk Seri Chan Kong Choy said the Government planned to install these digital cameras at some 300 accident-prone areas along trunk roads and highways early next year.
The cameras will also be mounted at traffic junctions in urban areas.
The devices will operate round- the-clock and will relay the photographs, along with information on the nature of the offence and the time and date, to the Road Transport Department and the police.
Summonses will then be issued, either by the RTD or police, according to the nature of the offence.
The cameras will capture those who speed, drive recklessly or cross double-lines.
“For motorists, of course, there is nothing to cheer about. We want them to follow the rules to reduce fatalities,†Chan said.
The Road Transport and Road Safety departments – whose staff recently visited the United States, Britain, Germany and Australia – are talking to several foreign companies about the camera models and the cost.
Chan said the Ministry was eager to implement the system because it appeared foolproof.
“The cameras will be handled by an independent foreign operator. They will provide the system and the technology, and we will not be burdened with the high cost of getting the sophisticated system,†he added.
He said that the company would recover its costs from the commission it earned from each summons issued by the authorities.
“We will pay the operator from the money obtained from the summonses,†Chan said, adding that the method had been successful in countries such as the US and Australia. — NST
April 17th, 2006