Now that I've read most of the article, I take back some of what I said. Your basic assertion was that partnering with Samsung could be a bad idea - and I now agree that it should be approached with much caution, if considered at all.
Interestingly my new statement jibes with my earlier comment - that Samsung used this partnership with Pentax to get access to the technology and process of lens design. Their designs may not be direct copies of Pentax lenses, but they certainly learned how to make an 18-55 kit lens (which really got them started in the market), amongst other things.
---------- Post added 06-08-14 at 06:07 PM ----------
Originally posted by Fogel70 
It's not much they can copy from DSLR lenses to use on mirrorless cameras with much shorter register distance as the lenses then will crippled by design. (except telephoto lenses)
Most APS-C systems get lenses with equivalent AOV as have been used for decades on 36x24mm systems, so there is no surprise that lenses are similar between systems.
I just looked it up. The Samsung NX 18-55 kit lens uses the same arrangement (so likely the same basic design) as the DA18-55: 12 elements in 9 groups inc. 1 aspherical element (as per Photozone). In contrast, all the 18-55 lenses from Canon, Nikon, and Sony use different arrangements. Perhaps Samsung has the legal right to do this, but a mere coincidence? I think not.
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