In a recent interview with Nikkei.com, President of Canon Inc. Fujio Mitarai is apparently not bullish on the future of global sales for digital cameras, estimating that the market for interchangeable lens cameras is only about 10 million units a year and that mirrorless is not growing it overall.

This news seems a little contradictory to what else we’ve been hearing from other Canon executives swinging from the fences lately with rumors of updates for their mirrorless Canon EOS R dropping the touch bar and even teasing an 8K version “on the roadmap” soon.

Other odd tidbits from the Mitarai interview include insights into Canon’s future business strategy to shift more towards corporate sales over consumer with a focus on industrial, medical and surveillance.

As a publicly traded company, Canon can’t hide the fact that their camera sales have declined around 10% over the past few years. Yet, Mitarai doesn’t blame this on Canon’s reluctance to move towards mirrorless quicker, citing that mirrorless cameras aren’t adding to the market, rather just slowly replacing DSLRs.

Overall Mitarai see the digital camera market shrinking up to 50% over the next two years, and is apparently not looking to focus more research and development in the interchangeable lens camera market.

We’ll keep an eye on Canon news and developments at the upcoming NAB and throughout the year to see if these premonitions hold true, or if Canon is just talking quietly before bringing out a renewed focus later in the year.

Source: Nikkei

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