Wednesday, October 19, 2011

Canon's Road to Total Dominance


Two days ago, on the 17th October 2011, Nikon announced that they have produced a total of 65 million Nikkor lenses since 1959. Less than 24 hours later, Canon made a similar announcement, declaring that they have produced a total of 70 million EOS lenses and 50 million SLR camera bodies since since 1987. This seemingly mundane and regular announcements hailed a historic moment for Canon, which for the first time managed to surpass the total number of lenses produced by Nikon despite seemingly dominating sales charts for the past decade.

You see, Nikon was the dominant SLR maker before the digital age, and since 1959 millions of Nikkor lenses has been produced before the EOS mount format was even created. Canon had always played second fiddle to Nikon in the past. Moreover, Nikon had an almost 30 years headstart before Canon started selling their EOS based lenses. This is why, despite being the recent market leader, surpassing the total number Nikkor lenses ever to be manufactured is no small feat.

Having achieved that sealed the EOS system as the most popular SLR lens format of all time. Let's recap the road to dominance for Canon.




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1 comment:

  1. AnonymousFebruary 9, 2012 at 3:30 PM

    No surprise there. Canon is the leading camera brand since the early 2000s. Between 2006 and 2008 Nikon manage to close the gap having 37% of the DSLR market compared to Canon's 38%. In 2010, despite falling sales due to the rise of mirrorless interchangeable lens cameras, Canon manage to be dominant again with 44.5% market share leaving Nikon with Nikon 29.8%. Sony manage to grab the number 2 spot from Nikon in the UK and Taiwan market. In recent news, Canon profits rose but sales fall, possibly due to the company's insistence to embrace the mirroless camera format.

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