Hey Uccemebug,
I don't believe Hoya went to Citi, but somebody did (probably the company involved in negotiations to purchase the Pentax Digital Imaging Division, that is one of my reasons for suspecting Kodak. Kodak and Citi are both stateside. Kodak is a shrewd company with its business proceedings, not so much on execution and follow through. What I have seen of Kodak is that it survives a lot on litgation and intellectual properties.
Kodak has had successful lawsuits against Sony, Samsung, Sun Micro Systems and I believe Nikon and Canon as well. Kodak's Porta film was great. It's a T-Grain based color negative formulation. I used Porta a lot in 35mm and 120 when I shot portraits. That's awhile back; I used to develop my own film and print also.
I see your point and agree with you on Hitachi. Hitachi is the parent company of Epson. Epson did release a Leica M clone, the R-(something) that was really awesome but I believe it was only sold in Japan. It's a shame, it was a great camera. I thought about purchasing one a few years ago but passed on it. Hitachi does manufacture imaging sensors also. The Hitachi-Epson group would be a much better fit than Kodak.
I find Kodak very disappointing. In 2009 Kodak closed its CMOS sensor division to focus soley on CCD sensors.
Image Sensors World: Layoffs, Layoffs
Kodak had only acquired that division in 2004 or 2006 if I remember correctly. Whether we like it or not (I do), video is here to stay in DSLR's. You can see many great examples at Vimeo.com. It's like Flickr for but for short videos instead of photos.
Nikon and Canon are both making video standard on all of their upcoming models. Pentax has it on the K-X and K-7, etc. Video and LiveView are not possible with CCD sensors. The sensor has to be CMOS. With Sony being stubborn about keeping CCD in its FullFrame Cameras (rumors of early 2011 of two new CCD Sony FullFrame DSLRs) and other problems at Sony, no wonder no one wants to buy their cameras.
Leica's own Stefan Daniel is on record as saying he would like the eventual replacement of the FullFrame M9 to have Video or Live View. It read as subtle hint at dropping the Kodak CCD sensor that is currently in the M9 in the next model.
Getting back to Kodak, they are a very badly managed company. 110 film was garbage, Disc Film was garbage, APS-C Advantix = more garbage, plus it was Kodak that was pushing the original 4/3 format. The whole 4/3 format to me is a huge joke and a big waste of money. The only companies that fell for 4/3 were Panasonic and Olympus. Both of whom are rumored to be working on larger format cameras. When Kodak first announced the 4/3 format it trumpeted that a large number of companies were going to join the 4/3 group. No one really did. Kodak wasn't even ready at the retail level with the photo kiosks to print pictures from the 4/3 cameras!
A coworker of mine recently bought a new Kodak point and shoot digital camera. She knows I'm into photography so she brought it to work to show me and get my opinion on it. It looks nice, it has a Schneider lens, but when I saw the pictures she had taken with it I was blown away. The pictures were horrible! The pictures from the Kodak had extremely bad chromatic aberration and the lens was not that sharp. My old Sony DSC-V1 digital point and shoot completely stomps the Kodak into the ground. My old Nikon Coolpix 8400 point and shoot is even better.
I like Pentax, I just want to see Pentax grow and keep delivering great products. I really want a FullFrame K-Mount DSLR from Pentax, but with the rumors lately I don't see that happening. I am most likely heading back to Nikon. Regardless, I don't want to see Pentax become a victim of Kodak's incompetence. The Hitachi/Epson group would be a much better fit. Even Fuji! Fuji is somewhat aligned with Nikon though.
Time will tell, Photokina is next month! I wish Pentax the best and truly believe Hoya would be best served by holding onto Pentax. R&D from the camera group can be shared with the medical group, etc. Selling the Pentax camera group is too short sighted. Rome wasn't built in a day. Pentax was badly managed for a number of years. Hoya has the management skill and resources to breath new life into Pentax and make it successful again.
Originally posted by uccemebug So you're guessing that Hoya went to Citi directly and bought this analysis? And that it wasn't someone else attempting to .. I dunno, manipulate Hoya's stock price? Discredit the company? Or do any of the countless other things that they use investment bank research for?
It wouldn't be the end of the world. Certainly less ludicrous and disastrous than a near-bankrupt and non-participatory JVC as per last year's commentary.
It seems to me that what Pentax needs in an owner and/or partner is distribution in the consumer electronics field, someone who's interested in cameras. Perhaps Hitachi?
Porta's great, I shoot it all the time.