Olympus and Panasonic have jointly announced that five more companies have recently declared their support and will be introducing products compliant with the Micro Four Thirds System standard.
The companies include (in alphabetical order) Blackmagic Design, JK Imaging, PHOTRON LIMITED, SVS-VISTEK and ViewPLUS Inc. Blackmagic Design is an Australian company established in 1984 that manufactures high quality electronic equipment for broadcast and video production. It is the only one of the new supporters with an existing product that supports Micro Four Thirds lenses.
JK Imaging is a Californian start-up company established in 2012, which was recently announced brand licensee for Kodak-branded cameras, pico projectors and other digital imaging products. For more information on this company, read the summary of what is known publicly to date at http://www.photocounter.com.au/2013/kodak-camera-licence-to-unknown-start-up/ . Kodak was a founding member of the original Four Thirds standard but did not produce any cameras compliant with it, although it did manufacture some sensors. JK Imaging showcased an M4/3 camera at a press conference in China last week but released few details of it specifications and nothing about a proposed launch date. The camera appears likely to be manufactured by Asia Optical, a Taiwanese OEM producer.
PHOTRON LIMITED is a Japanese company established in 1968 that provides manufacturing, sales and service of professional film and video equipment and photo- instrumentation. SVS-VISTEK GmbH, a German company established in 2001, is involved in the development, manufacture and distribution of professional machine vision components and systems. ViewPLUS Inc. is another Japanese company established in 1998 that provides video equipment and the solutions which link communication and image processing as well as sensing technology.
The press release and links to the new companies’ websites can be found at http://www.olympus-global.com/en/news/2013a/nr130121mfourthirdse.jsp.
