When the King of the Hill admits defeat, you know the game is over. And according to what both Canon Watch and SlashGear are saying, that’s the case with Canon and the low end point and shoot game. They both cite a Google Translated article stating that Canon is ceasing to focus on cameras under the $200 entry point because of the way that smartphones have affected the sale of compact cameras. Instead, they’re going to be focusing on higher end compacts and their DSLRs. As far as the latter goes, Canon is the #1 seller. Despite being very conservative and trying to make sure that no camera eats into the others’ sales, they’re still not producing bad cameras at all. In fact, no one that is a major manufacturer is.
What this could mean in the future is that CES and other trade shows may be a bit more dead or more focused on higher end products. On top of that, we may not see the major innovations and risks taken by the company that we saw from 2008 on for a while. When the company was first producing the 5D Mk II, announcing the 7D and 1D X, and making the Rebels better than previous generations it was a much more exciting time.
Here’s to looking forward to Photokina 2014.
