The Digital Camera Market in 2006

Here are some interesting facts for 2006 for digital cameras. According to Reuters, Canon has topped the market share in global digital camera shipments in 2006, however South Korea's Samsung Electronics jumped up the ranks to 5th place from 9th a year ago. Nikon is ranked 6th in the world.

Tokyo-based Canon shipped 19.7 million digital cameras in 2006 which accounted for 18.7 percent of the overall market. Canon's shipments jumped 23.3 percent from 2005.

In total, the Industry wide digital camera shipments in 2006 rose 14.5 percent to 106 million units from a year earlier. This was driven by the strong popularity of Digital Single Lens Reflex (DSLR) cameras. DSLR shipments grew 39 percent to 5 million units last year.

Sony Corp was No. 2 in the market with a 15.8 percent share, up from 15.2 percent in 2005. This was helped with the introduction into the DSLR market with the Alpha A100.

Eastman Kodak which is the only U.S. Company among the top five digital camera makers, ranked third with 10 percent, a drop from its 14.2 percent share a year earlier. This could be due to their exit of the DSLR market a few years ago.

Olympus Corporation came in fourth with a market share of 8.6 percent, down 9.8 percent in 2005.

The big winner in 2006 was Samsung, who displaced Nikon and became the fifth-largest seller of digital cameras in the world. Samsung has expanded its market share to 7.8 percent in 2006 which is a huge jump from the 3.8 percent it had a year earlier.

Nikon Corporation, the world’s second-biggest maker of professional cameras (DSLR) after Canon, ranked No. 6 in the overall digital camera market with a 7.6 percent market share in 2006.

Digital SLR Market
Canon also dominated the booming DSLR market, securing a 46.7 percent share in 2006, with its shipments rising 30.7 percent from a year earlier. But its share was trimmed from the 49.5 percent it had in 2006 amid increased competition from rivals.

Nikon cemented the No. 2 position in DSLRs with a 33 percent market share. Its shipments jumped 35.9 percent with the introduction of successful models such as the Nikon D50, D70s, D80 and the D200.

Sony, which purchased the DSLR unit of Konica Minolta Holdings, shipped 326,240 DSLRs in 2006, accounting for 6.2 percent of the market. A great result after being in the market for under a year.