Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2011/08/17
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Five minutes of research revealed the following Wall St. Journal article on Leica's finances and Kaufman's acquisition of the company: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB122152103387739231.html If Leica's sales stay as robust as they have been in 2011 and Herr Kaufman takes out most of the profits as a dividend, he should be whole in about a dozen years. However he maintains that sales have to increase before there is a surplus large enough to institute a new camera development program. Reading between the lines, I infer that much of the design of the M8, M9, and S2 was completed before Kaufman bought the company. Certainly the sensor is a Kodak product. I remember receiving press releases from Kodak about microlens digital sensor technology about nine or ten years back when they were trying to convince Wall St. that their digital efforts would pay off. It may be a long time before we see an M10 or a digital CL. Larry Z