Thread: Will Olympus crush Panasonic now Sony are backing them?

IMHO - no

I spent quite a lot of time in Japan in the 80's and early 90's

The Japanese economy works in a different way to "the western world"

In one word - "keiretsu"

Keiretsu is hard to appreciate for Westerners - it is simultaneously one of the great strengths of the Japanese way of doing business - and one of the weaknesses. those who want to do business in Japan ignore it at their cost.


Sent from another Galaxy

Originally Posted by bartjeej

Yes, to my knowledge all of the current E mount lenses are built to cover only an APSC sized sensor, but the E-mount NEX VG900 video camera has a full frame sensor. Right now you can either use it with an E-mount lens and use only an APSC-sized crop, or use it with an adapter and one of Sony's full frame lenses. But it would make sense for Sony to produce E-mount lenses that support an FF sensor in the future... which would also make a full frame, E-mount stills camera that much more likely.

and to follow up on that, according to sonyalpharumors the E-mount FF camera is due in 1 year! They give the rumor their highest SR5 rating meaning it's "almost certainly correct"... Sony really is on a roll with gamechanging cameras!

[sorry if this is slightly OT, maybe we should start a seperate thread about this?]

Originally Posted by bartjeej

...it would make sense for Sony to produce E-mount lenses that support an FF sensor in the future....

I don't think it would make sense given that Sony are already pushed to deliver lenses for E mount and A mount as it is. Adding yet another lens line up would only slow down development of existing lines further still. The only way it would make sense is if Sony planned to phase out A mount lenses in a couple of years time and produce E mount only (with an E to A adaptor) which wouldn't work very well on SLTs. Tough on those people currently investing in the A99.

Of course, just because it doesn't make sense it doesn't mean Sony won't do it.

but what would be wrong with making lenses that have an E mount and have enough coverage for a full frame sensor? As long as the lenses also make sense on a crop sensor given the current lens range, I don't see a problem. For instance, if the new 35/1.8 could cover a full frame sensor, you'd have a 35mm FF lens or a 50mm equivalent crop lens...

Originally Posted by bartjeej

but what would be wrong with making lenses that have an E mount and have enough coverage for a full frame sensor?

Nothing 'wrong' but they would of necessity be bigger, heavier and more expensive. Why penalise the majority of NEX users who are using APS sensors to facilitate what would only ever be a minority using FF users?

fair point - the NEX lens line-up is already being criticized for being too large compared to Samsung NX and m43 lenses.

It's not in Oly's interest to "crush" Panasonic. A healthy Panasonic is very good for Olympus, and competition is good for us. Innovation and competition in m43 has brought us 5 axis IBIS, full remote tethering via smartphone, in camera RAW stacking, and touchpad focusing when using the EVF. Good stuff not available in other systems.

Sony invested a certain amount of money in Olympus to get access to their technology -- particularly for lenses. Or so the story goes. Sony's lenses generally aren't as good as Olympus.

They don't own anything like a majority share but would be in a fine position to buy out Olympus photography assets is Olympus can't make a go of it. Sony might benefit more if Olympus failed than if it succeeded so to me that makes it a not very clear cut issue, lol.

Originally Posted by entropic remnants

Sony invested a certain amount of money in Olympus to get access to their technology -- particularly for lenses. Or so the story goes. Sony's lenses generally aren't as good as Olympus.

They don't own anything like a majority share but would be in a fine position to buy out Olympus photography assets is Olympus can't make a go of it. Sony might benefit more if Olympus failed than if it succeeded so to me that makes it a not very clear cut issue, lol.

Sony already had Zeiss on the lens technology side. Also, decades of being the market leader in the broadcast market.

Sony and their Softbank allies control about a quarter of all the shares in Olympus. For any publicly traded company, that's a lot. In many corporations, there is no single entity with a majority of the shares. It's the biggest voting block that steers the ship. I think Softbank/Sony are the largest voting block in Olympus.