Originally posted by Mistral75 more mirrorless cameras than DSLRs were shipped in October
The difference between mirrorless shipped and produced (in units) is larger than the difference between mirrorless and DSLR produced, production of DSLRs was ever so slightly higher than mirrorless in October. Since mirrorless production (in units) is up over September 2019 and October 2018, this suggests that DSLR manufacturers are building inventories, whether they intended to or not. It is also worth noting that mirrorless production for Jan-Oct 2019 is still down -15% compared to Jan-Oct 2018, so we can see the effect of Canon and Nikon building mirrorless inventories last year to support the launch of new lines. The real story is how badly DSLR sales are dropping.
DSLR sales are dropping fastest in Japan (only 16,002 DSLRs were shipped to Japan in October, almost a 60% drop from October 2018), although for the Jan-Oct period, it is more severe in Asia-not including Japan. The CIPA stats also show significant discrepancies between global regions, Asia-not including Japan and Europe were especially strong in October for mirrorless, Americas and Japan were down for mirrorless compared to October 2018 and for the Jan-Oct period, mirrorless for Asia (including Japan this time) is down compared to the same period in 2018. The Japanese market for all ILCs was so dead in October it was only double that of the Others region (Australia, Africa and the Middle East); I didn't do a historical analysis, but I'm sure that ratio has never so low and I don't think the Japanese market in general has ever been so insignificant in global terms.
The per unit value of mirrorless is much higher for the Jan-Oct period compared to 2018 (it actually declined for DSLRs). The significance of this is that introducing new product lines are fixed expenses that need to be covered by sales volume and inevitably higher prices result in lower unit volumes (especially in mature markets). If you are an accountant for a camera manufacturer, that makes it very difficult to justify developing new product lines, even if they are mirrorless, because the potential unit volume is too low to cover the initial fixed costs. Camera manufacturing is more and more becoming a specialty business catering to professionals and professional wannabees with higher than average disposible income and there is nothing to indicate that the number of people in either category is increasing.