[clackers]

Not to mention that Ferdinand Porsche designed the Volkswagen Beetle...(under contract from Adolph Hitler)

And the Tiger tank.

[boriscleto]

And the Tiger tank.

He was involved in the design of both the Tiger I & Tiger II, but Henschel was awarded the contract. Porsche had built 100 chassis which were turned into the Elefant. Henschel was also given the contract for the Tiger II because Porsche's design was too unconventional. The turret of the early production Tiger II used a turret wrongly called the "Porsche Turret". It was actually designed by Krupp...

[eddie1960]

I think if you shoot hassleblad you've been worried for a long time if you pay attention, lots of bad decisions in the last twenty or so years, and some serious competition in the last ten from Phase (and Pentax to some degree) the X1D may prove to be the sviur on the profit line but so far i haven't hear great things.....and the Fujis is about to land with enought money to actually produce the cameras needed and from a financially stable brand (who are already making medium format money manufacturing lenses for Hassleblad)
I hope they survive and rediscover their roots but in what is a much smaller market than it was in film days they will really need to up their game and i'm not sure they will have the long term cash for that\

[Culture]

The question that has not been asked is, If Hasselblad being as cool as they are, cannot get money from their own investors, Doesnt that say more about how the investors have treated Hasselblad than how DJI will?

[RonHendriks1966]

Hasselblad is like a vineyard. You are proud to own it, but at some point you will get annoyed with the moneydrain that comes with it.

[mecrox]

The LuLa article reads more like an obituary than anything else, which may well be a little premature Even so, we live in times when confidence and image are all, so the prospect of photographers investing $10-20K in Hasselblad kit in these new circumstances might take a hit when solid, stable outfits like Fuji and Pentax are ready alternatives.

VCs are a shark-like breed, imho, and well worth avoiding. I'm reminded of what happened to SuSE Linux back in the day. It was the flower of European computing and a very good system indeed, but they got mixed up with dodgy investors ... and one day the investors sold out from under them and SuSE woke up to find themselves owned by a gang of numpties out of Utah who went bust with all due predictability. SuSE is still going, but today it's a shadow of what I think it could have been with sounder long-term investment rather than short-term exitism.

I've no idea whether the same could ever be the case with Hasselblad and I certainly wish them every good fortune. But either way Pentax has been very, very fortunate. Only a lot of time will tell whether this is an inspired move rather than a quixotic one. After all, why are the new owners doing it?

[wildman]

---------------------------------------------------------
DJI (company)
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
DJI
大疆创新 DJI logo.png
WMCH Drone.jpg
DJI Phantom 1
Native name
大疆创新科技有限公司 (Dà-Jiāng Innovations Science and Technology Co., Ltd.)
Type
Private
Industry

Technology Consumer electronics Videography Photography

Founded 2006; 11 years ago
Founder Frank Wang (Wāng Tāo)
Headquarters Shenzhen, Guangdong, China
Area served
Worldwide
Products

Unmanned aerial vehicle
Camcorder
Camera stabilizer
Flight platform
Gimbal
Flight controller
Propulsion system

Revenue Increase $1B[1] (2015)
Number of employees
c. 3.3K[2] (2015)
Divisions

China Japan North America Europe

Website dji.com

Dà-Jiāng Innovations Science and Technology Co., Ltd (Chinese: 大疆创新科技有限公司; doing business as DJI) is a Chinese technology company headquartered in Shenzhen, Guangdong. It manufactures unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV), also known as drones, for aerial photography and videography, gimbals, flight platforms, cameras, propulsion systems, camera stabilizers, and flight controllers.

According to an article in The Economist in 2015, DJI is the leading company in the civilian-drone industry.[3]
---------------------------------------------------

A possible scenario:
Move all production to low cost Asia, if it isn't already there, and leave all development, research and marketing in the "first" world where the market is.
Perhaps a Hassi managed by DJI wouldn't have quite the same mystique it once did (like rosewood handles) but it would have the production capacity to meet demand for a MF that real people could actually afford.

---

Last edited by wildman; 01-05-2017 at 09:45 AM.

[bobmaxja]

Look the same as what happen with Volvo.

[D1N0]

Do DJI want to branch out to professional photography or do they just want a brand name for their drone camera's?

[wildman]

Do DJI want to branch out to professional photography or do they just want a brand name for their drone camera's?

Why not both?

[monochrome]

Look the same as what happen with Volvo.

New Volvos are pretty damned good.

[D1N0]

Why not both?

corporate focus

[reh321]

• Hasselblad Acquired By DJI - Luminous Landscape

I had troubles getting to your reference, but the official announcement
Hasselblad and DJI Form Strategic Partnership
says

Hasselblad Group, the leader in high-quality professional cameras, and DJI, the world’s most-innovative aerial technology company, today announced a corporate partnership through DJI’s acquisition of a strategic minority stake in Hasselblad. DJI joins Hasselblad’s Board of Directors.

so this is not quite an acquisition.

[D1N0]

I had troubles getting to your reference, but the official announcement
Hasselblad and DJI Form Strategic Partnership
says so this is not quite an acquisition.

That's a strategic partnership announcement from 2015. This is a new rumor from 2017.

[monochrome]

Venture Capital demands 45% annualized ROI for three years. They know their investment will either triple, break even or Zero. They sell the B/E at year three and add to the winner to get the 300%++ return. The Zero's are actually rare.

Private Equity has lower objectives and longer Horizons, but the want more day-to-day control, and they often alter the company and products dramatically (ref. what SPARX Asset Management and Hoya did to Pentax).

You can't fault a scorpion for stinging you - that's what it does. Hassy either made a poor (prior) choice of investment partner or took the only money they could get.