Originally posted by luftfluss It seems like you are at least a little fixated on marketshare, and we have seen in recent financial disclosures and marketshare data that marketshare ≠ profitability. If Pentax is not losing money with ~ 2% marketshare then they are doing a nice job treading water during this period of ILC camera "market adjustment".
I'm not interested in profitability nor marketshare, per se. But these do have an impact for what I do care about
: whether Pentax can or will be satisfying my photographic needs now or into the future. If revenues decline then the only way to maintain profitability is to cut costs. One of the chief ways to cut costs is to cut R&D. It's fairly easy to stay profitable if you are not paying people to do R&D or to develop cutting-edge technology, and are just ticking along selling a few cameras with a minor "upgrade" every few years (such as the K-1ii). There is no doubt in my mind that Pentax could remain profitable without entering the mirrorless FF market, but that does nothing to suggest that Pentax will be able or willing to cater for my needs or the needs of some others shooting FF.
Quote: Pentax has made it clear, for years, that they have no intention of entering the APS-C/FF MILC market. They've indicated this in product releases - "MILC Fighter KP" - and in interviews. There is, of course, always a slight chance they may surprise us, and as a K-01 fan I would love a new Pentax MILC, but to expect such a thing is not living in reality.
I'm fairly new to Pentax, and I only became aware of their explicit refusal to follow the rest of the market into mirrorless least year. That was a bit disappointing for me, but I didn't get into Pentax because I assumed it would go mirrorless. I did get into Pentax assuming that modern FF lenses that satisfy my needs would be in place nearly four years after launch, so my expectations exceeded reality on that score. I was informed that lens support for Pentax FF is weak, but I hoped to make do with the older glass until the relevant modern lenses appeared. In part, my needs have shifted, so I'm not *blaming* Pentax - its a "no fault" divorce that I'm considering.
Quote: As far as "...little effort and imagination they were willing to put into FF development"... it's difficult to take this seriously. The K-1 was groundbreaking, laden with features and innovation for such a bargain price. The MK II may be a tepid follow-up, but that tends to happen, and "marketshare leader" Canon has certainly fallen into that trap mulitple times, as have other brands.
It really is a case of "what have you done for me lately", and what that portends for the future. I entered into the Pentax realm with the K-1 two years ago. And I did so because it really was and is a great camera. Yes - that showed effort and imagination and it was in some ways ground-breaking. It was exciting to work with such a great camera. The k-1ii, for *my* needs, was a step backwards, not forwards. It's still intrinsically a great camera, but only because it is hardly any different from the original. The obvious lack of effort and imagination that went into the mark ii is indicative, to me, of the future, and is corroborated by the painfully slow development of new lenses. Maybe the mark iii, if it ever appears, will show a return to the effort and imagination of the original. We can hope. But I'm not very hopeful and how many years will that take anyway? Meanwhile, we have to wait for lenses to dribble out after extended delays if at all.
Quote: From your posts it sounds as though you made a mistake choosing Pentax, so really the best solution is to sell or trade-in your Pentax gear and move to another brand. It's that simple.
I don't view it as a mistake - it was the best I could afford at the time and I have loved shooting with my K-1. It would be hard to sell the gear I've loved using. But you could be right about changing being the best solution.
Thanks for your comments.