CIPA has reported its data for the first two months of the year, and so far the signs are extremely positive – even for DSLRs.
Yes, I said that – DSLRs, the camera system that refuses to die.
Overall for the first two months of the year, Japanese camera manufacturers have shipped 102% DSLRs and 143% Mirrorless cameras when we compare to the same period last year. Which is a nice change from the usual dismal news that we usually get with these reports.
Americas followed by China led the shipment growth as the Americas showed 167% gains and China 150% gains for the interchangeable lens digital camera market respectively. In case you are not aware CIPA's regional definition of “America” includes both North, Central, and South America, even though I think it's safe to say that the majority of the Americas market resides in the United States of America.
China over the first two months is edging closer to overtaking Europe as the second largest camera region in the world.
One oddity in the reports, that forced me to go back and look at last year, was the fact that Japan almost was shipped nearly as many compact cameras as it was interchangeable lens cameras. 53 thousand as compared to 78 thousand, with compacts making up nearly 40% of the shipments. Looking back through last year, we see a similar trait with Japan shipped nearly 43% of its total camera volume as compact cameras. This is a significant difference from the rest of Asia (not including Japan and China) where compacts were 17% of the shipments and China where compacts made up 9% of the total shipment volume.
Overall, approximately 779 thousand ILCs and 237 thousand compact cameras were shipped in the first two months of the year.
We can only hope the remainder of the year will show similar gains.
View the entire PDF report below, or download it here.
Source: CIPA
The longer DSLRs hang on the better for them.