Asia Optical Projects Shipment of 1 million 12x Optical Zoom Camera in 2008
Looks like the growth of digital cameras is unstoppable. You should have realized that the moment Polaroid decided to discontinue production of Polaroid instant films. According to Asia Optical, one of the four leading CCM and ODM/OEM digital camera makes in Taiwan, the company is expecting to ship around one million 12x optical zoom digital cameras above 10-megapixels on 2008.
Robert Lai, company chairman of Asia Optical says:
Retail prices for entry-level digital cameras – 7-megapixel and 3x optical zoom lens – will drop to around US$99 in March-April 2008, pushing ODM/OEM prices down to US$50-60. Such ODM/OEM prices are intolerable to self-producing Japan-based vendors and therefore they will be forced to release more orders to Taiwan-based makers who can still support small ODM/OEM margins of US$2-3 on prices up to US$55.
Another projection would be that 2-5 megapixel cameras would increase in volume and these cameras would always be equipped with Auto-focus. If what was said would happen, expect a flurry of low-cost digital cameras to soon hit the markets.