How many independant camera makers will be left?
 

I've been wondering just how many independant camera manufacturers will be left in a few years time? Canon for sure, Nikon probably (but you wonder if Sony has eyes on them), Panasonic will surely be around but I wonder if they'll be selling their cameras under the name of a casualty?
Olympus, Pentax, Fuji?

Hi Andy,

I'm not quite sure what you mean by "independent". There is a never ending round of corporate mergers and take-overs with different business' being bought by others, particular company sectors being sold off etc. This will continue, eventually every company will be a subsidiary of Macdonalds. I think there will still be different brands, selling different models, made by different divisions of perhaps a major parent company.

The fact remains that Canon and Nikon dominate the dSLR market, the share between these two will ebb and flow as models and marketing trends come and go. Other players will continue in their own little niche areas, though they may well need to tie up with other companies to survive. My own favourite, Pentax, has not so long ago announced a tie up with Samsung to develop new models as it clearly does not have the resources on its own to do this against the huge budgets available to Canon/Nikon, this kind of thing is the way the market will develop in the future I'm sure.

Regards,

Duncan

It is even more complicated that all of that!

Canon is the only DSLR maker that actually produces their own sensors!

Nikon DSLR sensors are made by Sony ... and Sony is getting into the DSLR arena. Where is this going to leave Nikon with their supplier also being their competition? Is Sony going to share the latest, greatest CMOS sensor with Nikon?

There are other companies besides Sony that make sensors - but what quality? what levels of research? what kind of quantities?

There is a lot more to a camera than just the sensor - but it is the heart of a digital SLR. There is room for more than a few different companies to offer their idea of the perfect camera. The niche market will always be alive with the high markups they can collect.

The same sensor in different camera bodies can produce very different images - the in-camera processor and its algorithms control much of an image's appearance. Maybe just a couple of chip makers can keep the entire industry supplied and alive.

Panasonic are working on a DSLR with Olympus and Leica using the 4/3rds system.

That also represents my view.

The real added value is in the software control. Manufacturers will always try to cut costs and outsource where its cheaper. There will also be manufacturer / supplier links between R & D departments that are benificial to both parties.

When it comes to Japaneese industry its sometimes difficult to work out the true corporate structures.

The parallel is surely with the PC industry - Intel dominate chip manufacture and Microsoft dominate operating systems. In the corporate sector a few brands are pre-eminent (Dell, HP, IBM, Toshiba) but accross the industry as a whole there are still many names out there. The other parallel with the PC is in the add-on market, a plethora of brands doing their best to add value to the basic box, so it is in the camera industry with third parties providing lenses, tripods, bags etc etc etc - There certainly will be a coming together of base technology but economics will always be the driver and as long as there is the opportunity to "build a better mousetrap" someone will.

"There are other companies besides Sony that make sensors - but what quality? what levels of research? what kind of quantities? "
Apart from Canon there are only two major chip manafactures Sony and Kodak and there about both equal in technology and amount supplied.

Unless Sigma come out with something new and better or drop the fovian chip I suspect they will be the first casualty of the DSLR market

Hopefully more will survive as a one or two horse race can only ultimately be bad for the consumer.

With the advent and progress of digital backs I see a possible resurgence of the camera maker as just that. There's no reason the digital element cannot be housed outside the camera and therefore be upgradeable. Maybe just wishful thinking, but I'd love Nikon to get back to making advanced cameras and leave the 'film' part to others, that way we get a choice.