[monochrome]

Could You provide the source please?

Unfortunately I can't.[EDIT: See below]

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Last edited by monochrome; 07-31-2014 at 01:28 PM.

[Poit]

As far as I know there won't be K-1 for some time because I'm just testing K-2.
Nothing special in compare to previous models, but it is full frame.
Oh, and a viewfinder is gorgeous.
Sorry, I can't pubished pictures and technical details before Photokina because of legal obligations.

Serious?! Don't toy with us!!!

Sounds plausible.....

[Doundounba]

Regarding financial numbers: would this be it? Looking at it, Cameras are in the "Other" category, but are not the only thing in it. Sales in this category have gone down -0.1% year over year. An interesting stat is that while Ricoh at large does 28% of its business in the Americas, in the "Other" category that percentage is only 3.8% (numbers are from p. 14). Also in the Other category, sales in the Americas are down 9.5% year over year...

EDIT: Oh, and I think monochrome meant 1Q2014 earnings, not 1Q2015, unless he has a Delorean with a flux capacitor... :-P [RE-EDIT: I stand corrected, it is 1Q2015...! See below.]

[cali92rs]

If releasing the 645Z was the reason for pushing FF off another year, i think that was a huge mistake. Your substituting small potential sales (full frame) for teeny tiny miniscule sales (645Z).
Ricoh said supposedly there was a worldwide 2,000 initial launch of the Z's, right? At B&H they are in stock, no waiting list, no back order.
In a day or 2, adorama will have them in stock, again, no back order.

[monochrome]

Regarding financial numbers: would this be it? Looking at it, Cameras are in the "Other" category, but are not the only thing in it. Sales in this category have gone down -0.1% year over year. An interesting stat is that while Ricoh at large does 28% of its business in the Americas, in the "Other" category that percentage is only 3.8% (numbers are from p. 14). Also in the Other category, sales in the Americas are down 9.5% year over year...

EDIT: Oh, and I think monochrome meant 1Q2014 earnings, not 1Q2015, unless he has a Delorean with a flux capacitor... :-P

USA is IKON Office Systems, which was acquired just prior to Pentax.

[IchabodCrane]

You're such a joker

How many times I have to say they should be blamed for that which can be attributed to them? There's nothing arbitrary in that, in fact it requires a reasonable explanation on why a specific thing should be attributed to them and not to another factor.

I cannot provide a date because there's no such thing - there's no hard limit before which we could blame Hoya, and after which we could blame Ricoh. So we have to look at the context; which in this case was "year after year, exhibition after exhibition".

Right now, Ricoh Imaging is working to solve the production capacity problem. Hoya's strategy was based on downsizing and cost cutting...

Okay but do you attribute anything to Ricoh that's not happening well? It's not realistic to believe all good things come from Ricoh and only bad things came and still come from Hoya.

[monochrome]

Oh, and I think monochrome meant 1Q2014 earnings, not 1Q2015, unless he has a Delorean with a flux capacitor

Nope. 1Q2015. Japanese companies generally begin their Fiscal Year April 1 and end March 31st, so this is the March, 2015 FY. We jsut finished the 1st Fiscal Quarter of FY 2015.

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Last edited by monochrome; 07-31-2014 at 01:28 PM.

[monochrome]

Ricoh said supposedly there was a worldwide 2,000 initial launch of the Z's, right? At B&H they are in stock, no waiting list, no back order.
In a day or 2, adorama will have them in stock, again, no back order.

So B&H and Adorama filled all their pre-orders and now their second shipment has arrived, which they ordered on spec. for inventory. Business as usual for the two largest US dealers. Who knows - maybe they have two each on hand.

I don't really know anything - but - I thought the initial planned production was 2000 units through December, 2014. That doesn't mean production plans did not change in response to pre-orders. There were some rumors that Japanese institutional orders were larger than expected.

When it was said that 645Z pushed many other things to the side, what is inferred is that production plans changed to meet the surprising pre-production indications of interest. A FF camera without FF lenses is pointless. For my money, I'd bet the lens engineers were reassigned to updating the 645 lenses with IS and specifically for the 44x33 sensor (so no more D-FA645).

Furthermore, we have no idea how much profit a run of a 'small' number of 645Z creates, versus a run of x number of a mythical FF in the same (limited capacity) production facility. A company like Pentax will do the most profitable thing possible at any given time.

[Kunzite]

Okay but do you attribute anything to Ricoh that's not happening well? It's not realistic to believe all good things come from Ricoh and only bad things came and still come from Hoya.

So far I don't see evidence pointing to Ricoh doing "bad things". All I know is that they're moving slower than I expected/hoped, but as for why, I can only guess.

[Pål Jensen]

Asahi man tends to know things. I never expected a FF Pentax to arrive because we've been let down so many times and for so long. But never the less, what a f**king joke this is. Year after year, exhibition after exhibition, it's just around the corner. And so many seem to have believed it once again. Like a cat chasing its own tail, almost at reach but never quite there.

To be fair, I don't think Pentax has erver promised an FF camera and certainly not one thats right around the corner...

[6BQ5]

To be fair, I don't think Pentax has erver promised an FF camera and certainly not one thats right around the corner...

That's how it would be such a surprise when it is announced!

... the super secret FF we've all be waiting for!

[Poit]

To be fair, I don't think Pentax has erver promised an FF camera and certainly not one thats right around the corner...

They have definitively and categorically said, since the last Photokina (so, almost two years now) that they will release a FF camera. I can't be bothered finding all the interview references where they made those statements, but they are easy enough to find.

So, to be fair (to us, the patiently waiting loyal customers) I don't think two years is an unreasonable amount of time to begin saying "well?..."

[mecrox]

Regarding financial numbers: would this be it? Looking at it, Cameras are in the "Other" category, but are not the only thing in it. Sales in this category have gone down -0.1% year over year. An interesting stat is that while Ricoh at large does 28% of its business in the Americas, in the "Other" category that percentage is only 3.8% (numbers are from p. 14). Also in the Other category, sales in the Americas are down 9.5% year over year...

EDIT: Oh, and I think monochrome meant 1Q2014 earnings, not 1Q2015, unless he has a Delorean with a flux capacitor... :-P

So far as I can tell from that page (page 14 in their report), Ricoh's sales of digital cameras are 85.66 per cent in Japan ("domestic"), 3.78 per cent in the Americas, 5.69 per cent in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and 4.87 per cent in Other (presumably the rest of the world excluding the above) rounding it out. Total sales are 28,573 million yen.

Perhaps this is all wrong? if not, then perhaps one can see one of the issues here. Ricoh are overwhelmingly a Japan-centric camera operation. One would presume from these figures - maybe wrongly - that if something won't work in Japan then it won't work period. FF is neither here nor there if there is no demand for it in Japan. The demand for it in Europe and North Amerca wouldn't cover even 10 per cent of Ricoh's sales.

The odd thing to me is that FF hasn't simply been dropped in favour of a MILC system since demand for that is strongest in Japan and Asia and that is where Ricoh seem to make about seventeen out of every twenty dollars. Well, who knows. To be or not to be unless it sells in Tokyo is maybe the question.

[Kunzite]

So far as I can tell from that page (page 14 in their report), Ricoh's sales of digital cameras are 85.66 per cent in Japan ("domestic"), 3.78 per cent in the Americas, 5.69 per cent in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, and 4.87 per cent in Other (presumably the rest of the world excluding the above) rounding it out. Total sales are 28,573 million yen.

Perhaps this is all wrong?

Yep
"Other" includes not only Ricoh Imaging, but also their financial and logistic business - which I suppose is very Japanese-centric.

[mecrox]

Yep
"Other" includes not only Ricoh Imaging, but also their financial and logistic business - which I suppose is very Japanese-centric.

Not sure about that. if you read the notes to page 14 at the bottom of the page below the regional breakdown it says "Other - Digital cameras". Anyway, even if this point in their report is ambiguous, the general situation isn't much altered unless the logistics business accounts for a hefty slice of the total.