[normhead]

Ricoh is trying to attract customers so they may price it more agressively than we expect. I would expect US$1200-1500 in line with their competitors with it drifting down a couple of hundred after a year or two.

Ricoh's CEO has advised the company to focus on profit margins not increased market share.

[ffking]

Ricoh's CEO has advised the company to focus on profit margins not increased market share.

at the extreme with no sales due to price there is no profit, kw this is a reductio ad absurdum argument, but the situation is quite complex when you both have to sell enough to recover R&D costs and charge enough to recover R&D costs - and make a profit.

[Kunzite]

Ricoh's CEO has advised the company to focus on profit margins not increased market share.

That was targeted to their Office division, especially for the North American market IIRC.

[normhead]

That was targeted to their Office division, especially for the North American market IIRC.

And there is evidence the camera divisions are exempt from this policy?

at the extreme with no sales due to price there is no profit, kw this is a reductio ad absurdum argument, but the situation is quite complex when you both have to sell enough to recover R&D costs and charge enough to recover R&D costs - and make a profit.

It sounded to me the CEO was trying to prepare the company for shrinking markets, so less sales overall, hence the need to capitalize on what sales remained. No one suggested there would be no sales. The argument that a small company with small sales can't be profitable can't be defended. My ex-brother-in-law belongs to a small software company with three partners and few staff, but they sell financial analysis software (that they code themselves) to banks, and the guy is worth millions.

There are many here unhappy with the way Pentax conducts it's business. Just looking at the shear volume of critical posts, you have to conclude, many of the ideas put forward here would probably mean the end of Pentax. It's fine to speculate, but what we are discussing here are untestable theories. No one is ever going to be proved other right or wrong. Most fit into the "talk is cheap" category.

It's nice to have input from marketing people. but when marketing people took over Apple they almost killed it. They had to bring the innovator back. There are marketers with a track record, but like everything else, marketing is not the only factor in the success of a company. I'm not sure big marketing campaigns can even be a factor for small volume producers. Hiring marketers in no way guarantees success. It can be the start of your long slow decline. It depends entirely on how good the marketers are at catching the public's imagination. I'm sure part of the reason Pentax now does so little marketing is because of the lack of positive effect of previous marketing campaigns on the bottom line. Marketing has to pay for itself, just like every other aspect of a business. I'm sure Pentax has some numbers that show what the return on their previous marketing efforts has been.

What sticks in my mind is the 1.4 billion estimate to bring Pentax up to Canon and Nikon levels in terms of brand recognition. That's a heck of an investment for a small company. If you are paying interest on it, you are going bankrupt. If it's your money, it would be better invested some where with more chance of return.

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Last edited by normhead; 12-07-2017 at 06:30 AM.

[Kunzite]

The burden of proof is yours; I don't have to un-prove your claims.

Right now, we don't have any indication of an impact on Ricoh Imaging. What we do know is that they'll soon launch the first D FA* prime - and other lenses will follow.
Ricoh Imaging's strategy was never about "buying" market share.

[normhead]

The burden of proof is yours; I don't have to un-prove your claims. Right now, we don't have any indication of an impact on Ricoh Imaging. What we do know is that they'll soon launch the first D FA* prime - and other lenses will follow.
Ricoh Imaging's strategy was never about "buying" market share.

All high end items in keeping with the "potential for profit margin over increased market share " logic. If they were going of market share there would be more lower cost new items and fewer premium items.

The burden of proof is yours;

Are we in court room and someone made you the judge? This is all speculation and for the most part nonsense. There is not proof of any of this. Believe what you want, I could care less. I'm certainly not going to waste my time figuring out what you would accept as a "proof." But I'm pretty sure whatever you propose, you haven't met it yourself. All I've seen here are deductions based on the inconclusive evidence that could be interpreted many different ways. Nothing has been proved, by anyone.

[Kunzite]

There's the law domain burden of proof, and the philosophical burden of proof; I'm obviously referring to the latter. For example, Ricoh mentioning Ricoh Imaging would serve as such a proof. Or, a visible change in strategy in that direction.
Argument from ignorance, OTOH, is a logical fallacy.

FTR, since the statement you're talking about no change in the public lens roadmap occurred. On the contrary, it got reinforced by the pre-announcement of 2 lenses, and the implicit confirmation that it's still valid when it was reposted with the same lenses.
Changes were made within the Office Equipment business (as reported in their Investor Relations site).

L.E. To keep this short, as of today I see no sign of a strategic change with Pentax.

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Last edited by Kunzite; 12-07-2017 at 08:03 AM.

[normhead]

FTR, since the statement you're talking about no change in the public lens roadmap occurred. On the contrary, it got reinforced by the pre-announcement of 2 lenses, and the implicit confirmation that it's still valid when it was reposted with the same lenses.

A change in the lens roadmap does not indicate pursuit of more market share, but could in fact simply being keeping and enhancing the current marketshare. They may in fact be manufacturing the number of lenses they need to service their current market, and every one of those lenses is done better or equivalent, often cheaper and lighter by some other company. They aren't offering something that is going to attract millions of users from other companies, because those companies don't have what Pentax offers. The Pentax version of the Trinity was the minimum they could get away with after they introduced the K-1. The 50 and 85 at least in concept were originally done by Sigma and pimped by DxO. The strategy where may be to just look at what's popular from Sigma, and assume, Pentax could sell those lenses if they made them. Especially since Sigma is no longer supporting K-mount and any appreciable way.

You present evidence, but, I'm not sure it means what you think it does. They are a camera company, they introduce lenses from time to time. Not introducing new lenses means you are no longer a camera company. Introducing new lenses is just what you do if you are a camera company. What strategy is behind it is completely unknown, except fr the part where they want to sell high end expensive lenses with high profit margin capability. And that supports the "profit margin" strategy more than "trying to gain market share" strategy.

At this point Pentax has pretty much abandoned new development for photographers like myself to produce Canikon and Sigma "Me too" lenses. If they were looking for market share I'd expect more entry level product and less really high end product. Apart from the DFA 28-105 and 55-300 PLM, there is nothing for us poor folk to get excited about, if we are shopping for lenses that cost under $1500 CAD.

That is an extremely restricted market. All the deals I see at Henry's are $600 entry level cameras. Those are the cameras that produce great market share numbers.

Current flickr numbers list Pentax K-30-K50--K-5 as 108 users. They list the K-1 and K-3 and GRII combined as a combined 42 users. Without a real camera by camera breakdown it's hard to tell, but it certainly looks like all but the DA*11-14 and DA 55-300 PLM are aimed at the smallest segment of their user base. IN the breakdown of users the Average Daily users for the K-3 is 152. For the K-1 138 K-3II 78

Including all Pentax models from before Ricoh, K20D -K-5 there are an average of 5006 daily posts. Add in the K-3 and K3II numbers and the numbers are over 700 APS-c user posts a day.

The K-1 is 108.

Pentax is moving towards high end glass even in APS-c with the announcement of the DA* 11-18. Profit margins not volume. 2/3s of their development is aimed at the 1/8 of their customer base that might be interested in premium product. Only the 55-300 is for us plebes.

Unrelated observation... there seem to be a lot ( as in a healthy majority) of Pentax customers that have never bought a Ricoh made Pentax. The guy who wrote "why I won't buy a K-3" must have been on to something. If Pentax were interested in increasing market share surely they'd be making something for those folks.

[Kunzite]

Norm, let's keep simple things simple.
At no point under Ricoh were they targeting market share as a primary goal (at least, they weren't implementing such a strategy). Ricoh's statement about moving focus from expanding the market share cannot possibly refer to them.
Things are clearer if you go to the IR site and read the actual statements.

I'm not interested in ancient history when discussing a statement made this year. By the way, the K-1 has 139 "average daily users" on Flickr, the K-3 has 152 and the K-5, 121.
Flickr: Camera Finder: Ricoh
Flickr: Camera Finder: Pentax

Now, can we get back to the D FA* 50mm f/1.4? Thank you.

[normhead]

At no point under Ricoh were they targeting market share as a primary goal (at least, they weren't implementing such a strategy).

Exactly my point. So why all the discussion about what Pentax has to do to increase market share?

We have folks going on about increasing market share, when that isn't currently a goal of the company, both from their actions and announcements. I'm sure they'd accept it if it happened but I see no strategy in place that would do more than keep the current user base happy.

[Rondec]

Ricoh is interested in making money. If there is a problem with their plan for Pentax it is that they want the imaging arm of Ricoh to be self-sustaining. If they had been willing to sink 50 million into Pentax (more than the purchase price) they could have been well on the way to a full lens line up and who knows what else. But they didn't and so Pentax is doing a "pay as you go" plan for glass and camera body expansion.

At the same time, it probably turned out for the best as this was a time when the camera market was shrinking considerably and unlike Nikon, Pentax didn't end up losing their shirts releasing a bunch of products that just sat on store shelves.

Norm is mainly making the point here (and elsewhere) that Pentax needs some slower lenses for the K-1. I suppose he is right, although my feeling is that those sorts of lenses are probably easier to design and release and probably will just show up -- probably at the same time as one of the featured primes with very little fanfare. It is nice to have a 70-300 variable aperture zoom that covers full frame, but it isn't actually going to drive sales of the brand. On the other hand, top end primes could be very good press for a company that has been an afterthought for a long time.

Personally, I would like to see a 20-ish f2 or f2.8 prime that has good sharpness wide open and strong resistance to flare. But Pentax isn't just making lenses for me and I guess I will continue to shoot with my DFA 15-30 till time comes that they have a lens that fits that bill.

[Kunzite]

@Normhead:
What discussion?

We're almost reaching a consensus that this is a high-end lens, priced accordingly.

@Rondec:
I've made the same point about slower (more compact) but high quality lenses in the lens survey from a while back. I'm still excited about these new D FA*s.

The 20-ish f/2 or f/2.8 lens might be the D FA from the lens roadmap. I'd really like to know something, at least about its availability.

[normhead]

@Normhead:
What discussion?

We're almost reaching a consensus that this is a high-end lens, priced accordingly.

@Rondec:
I've made the same point about slower (more compact) but high quality lenses in the lens survey from a while back. I'm still excited about these new D FA*s.

The 20-ish f/2 or f/2.8 lens might be the D FA from the lens roadmap. I'd really like to know something, at least about its availability.

You're a little late to that concussion if you're just coming to it now.

[Kunzite]

Lol; I knew that for quite some time. But there are always people hoping for unrealistic prices - it happened with the K-1 too, long after its price was leaked.

IMO it's a choice between:
a. price in line with the competition, excellent quality, ring-type SDM
and
b. lower price, gets grilled in the reviews for whatever differences in sharpness, DC motor

[Tom S.]

Ricoh's CEO has advised the company to focus on profit margins not increased market share.

Yes, because it's so much better to make $100 selling one item than it is selling a hundred items and only making $2 off of each item.

Roger Smith tried to increase profit margins in lieu of market share and the resulting philosophy drove the world's largest car company into bankruptcy.