Kyocera pulls plug on Contax

It's finally official. And sad.

Here's one of what is sure to be many obituaries:

http://db.riskwaters.com/public/showPage.html?page=210204

I sure hope Leica isn't next.

What's worse is that this is a _total_ photo-market exit - digital as

well as film.

As I've written elsewhere, the thing to know about Kyocera is that,

if they can't keep aloat in a given market by doing things their

own way, they simply leave that market, rather than cheapen the

product to sell at a given price point. I regard them as one of the

few large companies left whose philosophy appears to be more

product-driven than market-driven (anyone who remembers their

home audio components from the 80s and 90s will know what I

mean; they eventually left that market for the same reasons

they're now leaving the photo market).

Somehow, I'm not quite as worried about Leica; although there's

always a chance they'll flame-out as well (like they almost did in

the 70s), I have a feeling they're going to hang in there, albeit a

bit smaller (and, I would hope, a bit less frilly - enough of the

Leica a la Carte stuff, already!). I'm somewhat more worried

about, say, Hasselblad (Bronica's as good as gone already, and

I wouldn't put odds on Mamiya living it up in the next two to three

years). Fuji is Hassy's principal lifeline for now, but with Canon

stuffing bigger sensors in their top-end EOS model every other

year, even Nikon's having a time of it keeping up.

- Barrett

Sad news - and Leica is in big debts too, and the things keep getting worse.

Hasselblad and Mamiya are allready in the digital age so i feel confident for them - however if pros turn their backs to the medium format alltogether (which isn`t impossible) it may come out another way,...