Anybody interested in financial results? Réponses Photo has a piece on the camera manufacturers results from 2003:

- 50 million digital cameras sold in 2003 vs 60 million film cameras (demand sustained largely by emerging Asian countries).

- Kodak turnover up 11% in 2004 Q1 with numeric products up 44%
- Fuji is doing well thanks to progress in China and products like flat screens for TV's. Film only represents 10% of sales now (but apparently flat screen technology needs film technology??)
- Canon profit up 18% for 2004 Q1 and expecting to deliver 15.2 million digital cameras in 2004 (against 8.6million in 2003)
- Nikon profitable again due to "stepper" machines (used in making electronic components) and digital cameras. Nikon delivered 5.4 million digital cameras in 2003 and is expecting to sell 8 million in 2004
- Olympus delivered 7.4 million digital cameras in 2003 and expects to sell 11 million in 2004. Note that the low and middle-range digital cameras in the Olympus range are made by Sanyo, and that the principal activity of Olympus is medical equipment, which gives them a certain stability.

Just for France - 3.6 million digital cameras sold in 2003 which brings the total number of digital cameras in use to about 5 million (vs 19.6 million film cameras). However there were almost 25 million single-use film cameras sold in 2003 (+7%). Memory card sales are up 125% with 4.5 million sold in 2003

Charles