Believe me, I really live in the middle of the nowhere on a high placed town in the alps. And even the local magazine posted the “Olympus scandal” news on the first page. That negative publicity is going around all over the world. And more negative media reports are coming out every day. Olympus delayed once again the release of the financial report and is facing the possibility of being delisted at the Tokyo Exchange (Source: Bloomberg). And ex-Olympus officials face prison if fraud can be proved (Source: Bloomberg).
Is that kind of news affecting current camera sales? I asked a couple of dealers what they are experiencing in their stores. There is indeed a perception form some potential buyers that you should avoid to buy an Olympus camera. But sales are still constant. So there is nothing to worry about it yet. But I really hope Olympus will take action to convince us and the market that they will do the “right things”. I think that kind of moments can be very positive if you learn the lesson. I still have faith. The history of many companies showed that sometimes bad moments helped to create a new success (See Apple history)
The guys from MLZphoto sent me the GX1 unboxing video on top. Japanese folk will not have to wait a lot before the camera gets shipped. According to DC.watch Panasonic will ship the GX1 to the domestic market on November 25. All the rest of the world will have to wait weeks if not months (read the usual USA delays).
And the New York Times (Click here) really gives us a terrible news: “That revelation alone could make this one of the biggest accounting fraud cases in corporate history. It is also a spectacular turn of events amid a boardroom battle that has pitted Olympus’s former British chief executive turned whistle-blower, Michael C. Woodford, against an otherwise all-Japanese company board.”.
The first consequences of that news is that Hisashi Mori (executive vice president) had been fired and Hideo Yamada offered his resignation. According to Bloomberg the company may take legal action against the three (including ex Ceo Kikukawa).
And the second-biggest overseas investor “Harris” says that “Woodford should return to run the company and conduct the house cleaning“.
Panasonic talks about the future:
The guys from Photographyblog (Click here) do have a sort of “special” relation with Panasonic and posted a three page long Interview with Mr. Uematsu and Sykes from Panasonic. There are quite a lot of interesting info. Those of you that were wondering why the GX1 has no built-in viewfinder like the [shoplink 8454]Sony NEX-7[/shoplink] here is the answer: “That may price it out of the range of the people we’re trying to reach. And not everybody wants a viewfinder, so at least this gives the consumer the option of having it or not. Personally I do not use them…“.
And it’s not the best kind of communication and marketing when Sykes says: “If you’re lucky you might get it (the GX1) under your tree for Christmas. It’s that type of launch. So that campaign may move into next year. Obviously the G3 we see as a mass product. The GX we don’t think will be a mass product“. So Panasonic isn’t interested to sell the GX1 at the Christmas High Shopping Season?
Uematsu explains the m43 advantages over APS-C sensors: “Concerning low light function over high sensitivity. Of course a bigger sensor is better, however we have to be concerned not just [about] low light or high sensitivity. Picture quality should be considered in tandem with optical quality. Of course Sony’s APS-C sensor is bigger, but a big sensor with a small flange-back makes not such a good situation for the corners of an image. Sometimes the resolution there is much lower than at the centre of an image. But we believe our Micro Four Thirds is a very good balance between optical and also sensor performance.”
But in general Panasonic says a built-in viewfinder NEX-7 model is “under consideration”, and so a tilting LCD screen and OLED technology.
And of course there will be new lenses next year: “We have 14 lenses and have announced the development of a further two: the 12-35mm and 35-100mm for next year, but we feel we are missing a couple of key lenses in the line up. There are discussions and video conferences on going.”
And Sykes also talked to Amateur Photographer (Click here) where he said that: “We want to be number one in interchangeable lens cameras“.
The new Panasonic GX1 m43 camera and the new external viewfinder have been announced. I will continually update this post with all the interesting news and reviews I will find on the web.
There is a good news for all current [shoplink 16254]Panasonic GH2[/shoplink] owners! A new GH2 firmware update is coming in December. You can read the news here Panasonic website (Click here). There are many new features and fixes:
– New video mode which is suitable for editing video recorded at high bit rate (24Mbps)
– New functional option with Power Zoom Lens ([DISP FOCAL LENGTH (Display of Focal Length)], [STEP ZOOM], [ZOOM RESUME], [ZOOM SPEED] and [ZOOM RING*])
– Full area enlargement of AF area setting
– Improvement in the speed of consecutive shooting when shot with auto bracket
– Increased number of recordable images in consecutive shooting
– [EX.TELE CONV. (Extra Tele Conversion)] can be set ON/OFF separately in photo or video recording
– More accurate light adjustment of built-in flash
– Improvement in the AF performance in video recording
– Synchronization of alarm volume for low battery with [BEEP VOLUME]
– New [HALF-PRESS RELEASE] function
– Improved NR (Noise Reduction) in high sensitivity shooting
Photoscala (Click here) analyzed the latest Panasonic financial report. In summary, Panasonic lost 6% sales in the second fiscal quarter and the division “Digital AVC Networks” (which includes the digital cameras) had a 7% loss compared to last years quarter.
Panasonic also announced a new group organization (Click here to download the pdf).
Editor’s note: Neither Olympus nor Panasonic are doing very well this year. But I also saw that other companies are having problems. Strong YEN, Tsunami, Fukushima and now the Thai flood. There are many reasons why japanese companies are having a bad year!
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