Nikon Manager Mr. Nobuaki Sasakaki has been interviewed at DC.watch (google translation here). I do not speak Japanese so I rely on Google Translation tool. But it looks like the Nikon Manager keeps defending their Nikon 1 system by continually saying that sensor size doesn’t really matter a lot. And he also goes that far and says that Classic Design and Big Sensor trend of mirrorless cameras from other manufacturers are more or less just “hype”.
And you can understand clearly from many statements how Nikons focus will still be on the DSLR market.
I think Nikon is going to loose this game if they keep under estimating the mirrorless market. A real risk for a company that earns most of their money from the digital photography market!
P.S.: By the way, isn’t the Nikon DF also a classic designed camera…and therefore a hype? 🙂
8 Responses
You are right. Mr. Sasakaki aka “Bigmouth”.
OK what mattered was that Olympus, Panasonic and Sony also Pentax Q got to the same market long before Nikon 1 (too long in development) and before the target consumer moved onto smartphones, they also got their pricing right unlike Nikon.
I don’t believe sensor size was a big issue for it’s original target market, the marketing was too poorly implemented, in the UK Nikon was showing made for USA ads on expensive prime time UK TV with the catch line “if the Nikon 1 was a coffee machine…”! Also the marketing and design treated it’s target market as stupid and unsophisticated.
Classsic inspired design if implemented well works if it also doesn’t hamper function and is aspirational, look at BMW minis…
tbh todays smartphones and tablets look pretty soulless (along with lack of differentiation) so I can see good aspirational design become more important in the next 1-3 years as that market becomes saturated.
Whatever Mr. Sasakaki says or thinks is actually not that relevant, since it’s us the consumers who will actually decide whether ‘sensor size doesn’t really matter a lot. And……Classic Design and Big Sensor trend of mirrorless cameras from other manufacturers are more or less just “hype’. I understand your reservations about the translation, but if he did say that or something like that, then might I suggest that it’s not a great idea for him to second guess his potential customers or pretty much tell them what they SHOULD be thinking. Unfortunately both Nikon and Canon seem prone to say things like that. And they may find it rebounds on them in a less than positive fashion.
On the one hand, that’s a self-serving statement, but to be fair we wouldn’t expect any other kind from a manufacturer.
On the other hand, Nikon IS duking it out with Sony for #1 position among mirrorless camera manufacturers for sales in the US. Samsung being third. Everyone else being way down the list. So who knows, there may be something to what he says…
Et si Nikon nous fait une petite surprise ! Un S3 ou un SP téléférique numérique ! Moi j’achète tout de suite.
I never understand why people make such comments. It definitely comes back to bite them later. Everything will go mirrorless eventually. I wonder when the mirrorless moniker will go away. All of these cameras should just be called ILCs.
Sasaki is wrong for the reasons set forth by soundimageplus. But even if he understands and agrees with soundimageplus’s and the story’s market analysis, as a corporate executive, he may not be in much of a position to make statements along the lines of say: “Oh, yes, we’re behind!” “Oh, you are quite right — we failed to see the trend and got behind!” For example, he (and the shareholders to whom he may owe a fiduciary duty) may feel the need to defend a present Nikon system/product.
That’s the sense in which I “understand” such comments even when made in what seems to be the face of plain reason and fact.