I would never think that I will report a rumor on General Electric, but here we go:
"A spokesperson from its distributor in Singapore told CNET Asia that GE is looking to introduce its first Micro Four Thirds-like camera before the end of 2011."
GE currently has several different point and shoot cameras. I would be curious to know how many of those they sell every year.
Via Cnet
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20 Comments
Maybe when GE starts paying their taxes, photographers will start paying for their products.
“A piece in today’s New York Times by David Kocieniewski outlines how G.E. skirted paying any taxes on $5.1 billion in profits in 2010–in addition to claiming a $3.2 billion tax credit.”
http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_thelookout/20110325/ts_yblog_thelookout/g-e-paid-no-taxes-on-5-1-billion-in-profits
C’mon guys — that’s unfair.
GM cameras will be AT LEAST as reliable as their Nuclear Power Plants.
And those are doing well… Right?
I thought they were a finance company?
And nuke plants, appliances, light bulbs, jet engines, etc…. with billions in revenue, they managed to pay $0 in USA taxes.
Yeah, GE should fix their mess at Fukushima.
Boiling-water reactors is a damn’ good idea, congratulations to you, GE!
Fukushima is not General Electric fault, but Westinghouse. Please, check realibility of your information.
Actually, the plants are fine — its the safety controls.
For example, back up batteries last only 4-8 HOURS. Hours people. That’s crazy. 4-8 hours is all that separates you and armaggeddon. People can’t even drive to the plant in 4 hours after a disaster.
New designs need to have 7 days worth of back up batteries, in my humble opinion.
4-8 HOURS, seriously? Idiots, eveyone involved.
I know that i wouldn’t accept less than 24 hours if i was a General Manager in one of those plants. So whoever is running these things are definitely idiots with high degrees.
Some law maker is trying to get it to be 72 hours. Still too short!
Indeed, the Mk I reactors ARE General Electric designs. Check YOUR facts.
Well adding GE to Samsumg will help with competition and should help drive down prices, the US photo market is very large and a US supplier would be very compelling for the US.
Re: the tax issue – Well if the country’s laws allow it its not legally wrong, morals are often in short supply when shareholders want dividends. Change the Laws!
As individuals we are often quite moralistic and self rightious, but as a business group we behave quite differently with artificial aggressive bravado.
From Singapore!?
Tax planning.
whats wrong with Singapore?…
Micro-Four-Thirds LIKE? As if we needed another mount. Just join the u43 group and produce your cameras. Jeez. I hope GE never describes their camera as “micro-four-thirds like”.
It’s a consortium you can join, so join. A compact with a small sensor and interchangeable lenses is not the same as a near-DSLR camera, Pentax already completely missed the mark on that, I am going to go ahead and assume GE will as well, since I have not the faintest confidence that General Electric understands a whit of what a photography enthusiast wants in a camera.
Here’s a hint:
They want a 6-10 megapixel camera good for 12,800 ISO, and lenses from F1.4 to F2.0 in a small package but with a sensor close to APS-C size or larger. NOBODY is clamoring for a 1/1.5″ or smaller sensor in a camera marketed for enthusiasts or professionals. Nobody is excited by lenses that are f3.5-5.6 zooms, so don’t make many of those godawful hunks of useless, dim crap.
Any camera company marketing a compact-size sensor with 12800 ISO will be laughed at unless it has some significant tech heretofore unavailable which makes that sensitivity usable without massive plastic-wrap detail obliteration.
Everyone who likes micro-Four Thirds is looking for a poor-man’s Leica M9, a little portable camera that does not stifle their creativity or printable output quality. Assume it will be used indoors and in twilight a LOT, so if you have to choose between megapixels and sensitivity, go with sensitivity. A camera that can only print to 11X17 is still more useful than one that can only really be used in daylight. We can upsize to 300 dpi at larger sizes using various algorithms to reduce pixelation, but we can’t replace noise with detail.
GE faces a serious potential for “also-ran” disorder in this market segment. Missing the mark even a little means that your camera will not find a niche and be successful. I already predict Pentax’s little monstrosity will fail hard.
In general, the smaller the sensor you use, the faster the glass you must make for it. Panasonic has already figured this out and has placed some serious glass on their timetable. Olympus figured it out and added fast glass to their roadmap because of OVERWHELMING demand for that (it means they didn’t adequately read the market prior to product introduction). Anyone entering late must have fast glass on day one or face utter failure. If they go smaller (sensor) than Four Thirds, they must produce lenses that start at F1.8 at a minimum and produce an aperture of F2 or better at 50mm equivalent, and F 2.8 at 100mm equivalent AT A MINIMUM for the style of photography these are used at. (and to restore bokeh)
I can’t believe I posted so much in a thread about a GE camera. I suck.
Two possibilities:
1) Is it April 1st already in the far east?
2) IF GE is getting in the game, they’ll most likely badge-engineer an EVIL cam by another company.
Smells like government cameras! Expect fuzzy images and corrupt files.
LOL!
This makes no sense to me. Hasn’t GE gotten out of most consumer businesses? And even if they go ahead with this, I find it hard to imagine that they’re actually designing and building anything. It’s got to be some Chinese OEM product that they’re sticking their GE brand on or it’s just a license, just like anything you see with a Westinghouse, Zenith, Emerson, RCA or other defunct American company brand that you still see around.
well said axel
i ll pass on their products what ever they will be
not in my house like chevy
General Imaging licenses the GE name. They do not make cameras, someone else makes their cameras, possibly more than one company, and puts the GE name on them.
Since its a privately owned company, no financial information is available. They are just a shell company with a few employees.
http://www.manta.com/c/mmyv34w/general-imaging-com
Cameras are then distributed by D&H, a electronics distributor. This makes them available in a huge number of stores. I’m sure they sell a very large quantity of cameras, but the number is not yet published.
https://www.dandh.com/v4/view?pageReq=about