Just a Random Scary Thought About Nikon

[Wally]

Hello, I was chatting today with another photographer friend and we came up with a scary thought. As some of you may or may not know Konica/Minolta recently announced that they are getting out of the camera business and selling out to Sony. Sony is going to start making and marketing DSLRs for Maxxum Mount Glass. Sony has also said that they intend to be a major player in the DSLR market very soon. Also
as you may or may not know Nikon does not make the CCDs for their own DSLRs, they buy them from you guessed it Sony. All of this is true and widely available information.

Now here is my scary therory, what if Sony decided to all of a sudden to not make CCDs for Nikon, or charged them an arm an a leg for them. They could easily squeeze Nikon out of the picture in the DSLR market especially at the lower to mid prosumer end of the market. Canon would not have this problem as they make their own CMOS sensors.

I think at the very least Sony will save their own best CCD designs for themselves, which could put Nikon at a major disadvantage for new camera designs.

What do you think?

 

[Corry]

Hmmmm....interesting stuff. Don't have anything to add...but very interesting reading. I like my Canon. :mrgreen:

 

[hobbes28]

I think they would go to Fuji for their CCDs if Sony backed down since Fuji uses Nikon's bodies and Sony wouldn't want that to happen. Besides, it's better to have yourself as your best competitor...

 

[kelox]

I say long live K (in whatever form they take)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

 

[ShutteredEye]

Shoulda bought a Canon.....

 

[Unimaxium]

It would be a bad move on Sony's part to cut off Nikon or to provide them with sub-par sensors. If Sony begins treating Nikon badly, then Nikon can move their business elsewhere and buy sensors from another company. Sony is not the only company that produces CCD sensors, so it would not make Nikon any less of a competitor.

In fact, I don't see why getting into the DSLR business would make Sony want to start cutting Nikon off. Sony is already well into the digital camera market; they make nice consumer and prosumer cameras. I have a sony point-and-shoot myself. These cameras directly compete with models from Nikon, yet Sony still sells their sensors to them. I don't think moving into the DSLR business would be enough of a change to make Sony want to stop selling their CCDs to other companies. I'm sure they make good money by selling their chips to third-party companies, and cutting this business off would be cutting off a good portion of their own profit.

This is just like the reason that IBM sells chips to Apple even though both make computers, or why Apple makes the iPod and iTunes compatible with Windows. IBM is not going to increase sales of their computers by making chips only for themselves, so they might as well make money by selling chips to Apple too. Similarly, Sony is not going to make more money by cutting off Nikon, so might as well keep selling CCDs to them. And even if for some reason they did, Nikon would still be able to get CCDs from someone else.

 

[MommyOf4Boys]

Sony would be the one getting the raw end of the deal if they backed out of selling to Nikon. Nikon could simply and easily find another distributor for the CCDs.