> What Panasonic has is a proud history of producing mid level video cameras,
> dating to well before digital. It is not inconceivable to think that they may
> move toward making only m4/3 video cameras.
I had thought the same thing and hoped for a different internal
configuration within Panasonic, but the two groups are not even in the
same operating company. The pro-video division is 100% separate from
the imaging division which is actually nestled under "appliances".
There is evidently no technology sharing or common direction at all.
There's something historical going on there that makes no sense to the
lay-person. I suspect it may have to do with an old company
acquisition dating back many decades that keeps that division isolated
for whatever reason. Probably licensing and IP. While under the same
"Panasonic" umbrella, these massive corporations, like Fujitsu,
Mitsubishi, etc., that manufacture everything from consumer
electronics to heavy industry, have very isolated divisions with
absolutely no cross-over. The ownership umbrella is essentially an
investment bank.
Olympus probably would have been better served if they had done the
same and had the imaging division as a separate entity. For decades,
they've buried the losses of other divisions in the imaging division,
which rarely if ever, has shown a profit. Sadly, what this means is
getting rid of the imaging division will cause the other cash-cow
divisions to suddenly experience book losses that they can't bury in
Imaging. Olympus had jammed the imaging division with absolutely
massive overhead costs that nobody could survive. These companies
usually operate internally on a "cost chargeback" accounting model
that somehow appears to be rather one-sided in the case history of
Olympus. Normally this isn't a problem, but all it takes is for one or
two new board members or a new CEO that don't understand or agree with
that game to screw everything up and then they end up spinning off
divisions.
AG
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