Japanese market research firm BCN has released their ranking of sales data for consumer electronics companies selling in the Japanese market, DIYPhotography reports. The company aggregates data from thousands of Japanese resellers and ranks company performance based on sales volume.
In the SLR category the dominant players are Canon and Nikon, with Canon performing up five-percent from last year at 54-percent share and Nikon dropping three-percent from last year to 39-percent share. This is consistent with reports that Nikon missed forecasts for CY2014 and plans to restructure following a three-year low for their stocks.
In the SLR category, Sony has dropped from its seven-percent market share, which is not surprising based on the focus the company has had on their mirrorless offerings.
Here is where things get interesting—Sony is now the number one vendor in Japan of mirrorless cameras with a 34.3-percent market share. Olympus, previously the top seeded company, has been moved to second place with 22.3-percent and Panasonic at 11.9-percent.
At face value that might not seem so impressive, but this is a huge bit of news. Sony produces only three mirrorless cameras, the a7II, a7R and a7S. Olympus has six mirrorless cameras in its lineup and Panasonic lists eight current models in their mirrorless lineup. Together Olympus and Panasonic represent the bulk of the Micro Four Thirds camera system and combined they now sell just slightly fewer mirrorless cameras than Sony.
Likely this is due to some saturation in the Micro Four Thirds market. The system has been available for some time and customers don’t upgrade their camera systems annually.
But the fact that Sony could jump to first place in a category in which it didn’t compete until a few years ago is astounding, and bodes well for the camera system.