Zyoptics announced two new Micro Four Thirds lenses and here is the official press release:

The Leica D-Lux LX100 clone

As you may know Leica announced plenty of camera (full list at Mirrorlessrumors) including two Panasonic camera clones: The Leica D-Lux clone (here at BHphoto) and the V-Lux clone (here at BHphoto). Today Panasonic and Leica announced together that they will expand their partnership!

This si the official press text:

 Panasonic Corporation and Leica Camera AG today announced they have extended their partnership agreement and agreed to expand and strengthen their technological cooperation in the digital camera field.

The agreement includes the extension of license agreement for use of Leica’s trademark on Panasonic’s digital camera products as well as expansion and strengthening of technological cooperation between the two companies.
Based on this agreement, Panasonic will be able to commercialize digital camera products with Leica lenses over the next five years, from October 2014 to September 2019 while Leica will be able through the expansion and strengthening of technological cooperation to utilize Panasonic’s digital technology in its own product development. The agreement will allow both companies to boost product competitiveness by combining Leica’s optical technology and Panasonic’s digital technology.
The companies had signed a cooperative agreement for digital audiovisual equipment lenses in August 2000 and agreed to cooperate in the digital camera sector in July 2001.
Since then, the companies have built up a cooperative relationship in optical technology and quality control, and brought high-performance and high-quality digital cameras to the market by fusing Leica’s superior optical technology with Panasonic’s digital technologies such as image processing.
The technological cooperation newly agreed upon in this agreement will reinforce the partnership between the two companies, enabling them to accelerate the development of excellent digital camera products with enhanced appeal to the global camera market.
Yoshiyuki Miyabe, President of AVC Networks Company, an internal company of Panasonic, stated: “It is a great honor to be able to strengthen our bonds with Leica as a strategic partner. Panasonic will continue to incorporate Leica’s century-worth of optical technologies and camera traditions into the DNA of Panasonic’s digital cameras to further expand our business.”
Alfred Schopf, Chief Executive Officer of Leica Camera, said: “The signing of this agreement is significant for Leica as we seek further growth in the digital imaging sector. Strengthening our cooperative relationship with Panasonic is essential to Leica’s continued growth.”

Source Panasonic Japan. Found via Dicahub.

Image courtesy: PersonalView.

BestMirrorlessCameraReviews interviewed MR Terada, Mr Fandrey, Mr. Guthmann and Mrs Beckmann from Olympus. These are some of the key info we got from them:

1) The OM-D line is somehow easier to promote than the PEN line.
2) According to research, many people are using smartphones. Some are interested in interchangeable lens cameras, not compact cameras, because they already have a compact camera in their smartphone.
3) Olympus recognizes that photographers nowadays are also interested in video capabilities. Terada said: “Maybe 4K or new technology is something that stimulates our photographic users, and we should follow the market I think.”
4) At this moment Olympus has no plan to make a LX100 alike camera.
5) 300mm f/4 and the 7-14mm f/2.8 are coming in 2015. And so new OMD and PEN cameras.

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Olympus preorders:
Silver E-M1 body at Amazon, Adorama, Bhphoto, GetOlympus. In Europe at Wex UK.
40-150mm f/2.8 PRO lens at Amazon, Adorama, Bhphoto, GetOlympus. In Europe at Wex UK, Topshot and Fotomundus.
LH-76 lens hood at Adorama, Bhphoto, GetOlympus.
MC-14 1.4x teleconverter at Amazon, Adorama, Bhphoto, GetOlympus.
PRF-ZD62 Z protection filter at Adorama, Bhphoto, GetOlympus.
PRF-ZD72 Z protection filter at Adorama, Bhphoto, GetOlympus.
General links to all new Olympus stuff at Adorama.
ALL new stuff announced at Photokina at Amazon.

Panasonic preorders:
LX100 at Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto. Europe at WexUK.
GM5 at Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto. Europe at WexUK.
GM5 in red at Adorama.
35-100mm at Amazon, Adorama, BHphoto.

Image courtesy: ePhotozine.

I don’t know what’s the purpose of this but Panasonic displayed some special “Art edition” GM1 cameras. Don’t think these will go for sale. Or is Panasonic trying to check if they can follow Leica and Hasselblad route of special limited edition camera sales?