When Can We Expect a Chinese DSLR?

<p>In view of <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8471613.stm">China's growing economic strength</a> (Crisis? what Crisis?) I am wondering when we'll see a serious Chinese camera brand appear on the market. Should the Japanese be afraid? Will these DSLRs come bundled in our Happy Meals?</p>

<p>But seriously, when China decided they wanted to go into space, <a href="http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/3192330.stm">they put their heads down</a> and became only the third nation to do so. Launching a line of DSLRs and lenses, by comparison, seems easy.</p>

<p>What are your thoughts? Would this be a bad thing? Would it lower prices across the board? Would people trust Chinese photography products beyond those sold on eBay?</p>

<p>China ranks something like 118th in per capita income. Assuming a digital "Seagull" would have to be quite inexpensive to float on the domestic market, there's always a chance of it especially if cheap high quality Chinese-made sensors flood the market.</p>

<p>They must’ve gone past the dSLR stage. On the bottom of the Olympus E-P1 it says “Made in China”.</p>

<p>Gary, all they have to do is sell the cameras to dumb westerners like you and me :-) No need for internal sales at all.</p>

<p>It is like asking when one will find Made in China on something ones buys at a walmart, Home Depot; Office Depot; Staples; Kmart. Maybe there was a delay on posting this thread by a few decades! :)</p>

 

<p>This is the same old story here, when we first started to have Japanies goods here, we did not like it and thought it is so cheap made, today Japan leading the photographic world as well with many other stuff in our market.<br>

Chinees will also come to that level sooner or later, I have seen many DSLR made in Thailand, one of those marks as Nikon, will it be harder for the chinees to acheive, I do not think so.<br>

I have seen a panoram unit made by german company at the photo fare in Thailand this time and seen the same one made by chinna, the price is 10 time cheaper.<br>

I bought some chinees stuff this time , one of those things are the freq. trigers and they made with vrey high skill and they are working all ok.</p>

<p>Kelly, I'm not talking about stuff manufactured in China for other companies, I'm talking about a Chinese-born camera company, developing their own DSLR and lenses.</p>

<p>I suspect we may see a Chinese company make P&S digital cameras before we'll see a DSLR. The Chinese currently excel at producing low cost, mediocre quality stuff and could probably make a usuable P&S camera, not high tech stuff like DSLRs and Lenses. One day maybe, but not for a while.</p>

<p>In fact they do make lots and lots of low end P&S cameras already. They just don't put their own name on them. I'm not talking about Nikon or Canon factories based in China. I'm pretty sure Chinese companies make cameras and sell them in bulk to importers who put whatever name they want on them.</p>

<p>If you've ever ridden (or worse, worked on) one of their motorcycles or scooters, you'll know what I'm talking about in regard to the quality of their own products.</p>

<p>Remember that 50 years ago "Made in Japan" was often taken as an indication of low quality.</p>

<p>Japan didn't have similar foreign manufacturing investment in the 1950s-60s, nor were they buying huge chunks of Western businesses. The Chinese company Geely just bought Volvo off Ford. That should give a hint about what's possible in the imaging business and it won't follow Japan's development path. Pattern matching doesn't always work, Bob.</p>

<p> Just think of all the threads of people wanting to upgrade.</p>