Sony fab in Kumamoto closed because of the earthquake. Impact on Sony, Nikon Fuji sales

Sony had to halt the sensor production fab in Kumamoto because of the heavy earthquake. Sony is still evaluating the damage. But so far we can tell that this will definitely have an impact on camera sales from Sony, Fuji and Nikon. Nikon reported that their new DL compact series “will be delayed due to the serious issues with the integrated circuit for image processing built into the three new premium compact cameras, originally scheduled for a June 2016 release.

It’s unclear if Sony, Fuji, Nikon will also delay the launch of some of their still to be announced products (like the X-PRO 2 and Sony A9).

The “everybody wins” TIPA award announced

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As usual with the yearly TIPA award every photo company got to win a least one prize. They made up so many different categories for that goal! Don’t know how everyone can take them seriously…

Perhaps the only real news here is that for the first time in years Samsung won no prize. Obviously because Samsung pulled out of the market last year.

What’s coming as next: Sony A9, Fuji X-T2, Olympus E-PL8…

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Today the NAB show officially started in Las Vegas. As expected there was no new mirrorless system camera announced. Just camcorders…

Still, there are some exciting cameras to come soon!

In May Olympus will announce the new E-PL8 (not really exciting)
In June/July Fuji will announce the new X-T2 (much more exciting than the Olympus announcement)
In June/July Sony will also annonce what could be considered to be the very first PRO mirrorless system camera the Sony A9 (super exciting!)

Nikon and Canon are more likely to introduce their premium mirrorlesss system cameras at Photokina. But still no reliable info if those cameras will eb Full Frame…