Hi,
Putting up my own contribution about the subject.
What do we know :
- Samsung announced in april of this year that they are developing a FF sensor
link
- Pentax put on hold their 645 Digital Device developement,
- Hoya bought Pentax on June 2007.
Now general consideration about the SLR market.
- 2 brands are dominating the SLR market : Canon & Nikon,
- 2 brands are considered 2nd league players : Sony (ex-Minolta) and Pentax,
- The rest is more for the amateur, who want something more that the average P&S, while keeping weight and size low (that's where Olympus is putting its brand)
- For the brands that have FF sensors (C&N), they are slowly pushing them in the lower entry of their body lineup. The same happens for the APS-C sensor class, the K200D have the same sensor as the K10D, the K100D had the same sensor as the *ist.
I've read in several places that due to the massive investment necessary to keep up with the pace of the SLR market, the number of brands present on the market will get smaller and smaller.
I do not agree at 100% with that statement. I think that SLR presence is strategic for the P&S market, and that's why, for example, Panasonic and Samsung entered the SLR market.
For the same reason, I think that those brands will want to produce a professional SLR, and "professional" is tagged full frame in the average user mind. This statement is regardless of the viability of such a model, of the availability of an adapted lens lineup.
Everybody here talked a lot about what Pentax/Hoya wants and if they have enough funds to do it, etc... But to me,
the real question is what Samsung wants. IMO, the only reason why Samsung did not make the same thing with Pentax as Sony did with Minolta is that Japanese people would never accept such a famous brand as Pentax to be bought a Corean group.
So, will Pentax/Samsung produce a Full Frame body ?
- Yes, I'm nearly 100% sure of it.
Will Pentax/Samsung show it in september ?
- It may be a bit early.
My feeling is that, Samsung wants to be a major player in the photo market (that it entered recently) along with Canon and Sony. And for that they'll put enough money to be a respected player of the high end SLR market.
From some news I had from a
french site, Samsung is already 3rd of the market in volume, while Pentax is 4 times smaller.