News

Less than one month after announcing their plans to acquire US cinema camera manufacturer RED.com, LLC, Nikon stunned the photographic industry by declaring that they've consummated the acquisition of Konica-Minolta, a leading manufacturer of business technology and office products.

A Nikon official, who spoke under the condition of anonymity, revealed that the new entity will be reorganized into two divisions.

The MINOLTA division will be responsible for the reestablishment of the Minolta Maxxum, XD and SR-T 35mm film camera lines, along with Rokkor lenses and limited edition Color Enlarger II products for darkroom enthusiasts and Boomers.

The KONICA division will continue to manufacture category-leading office automation equipment and MFPs.

The deal, which become final as of April 1, nearly collapsed when Nikon executives in Japan discovered more than 300,000 units of APS cameras and lenses hidden in a secret closet at a now-closed factory in Sakai, Japan. Complicating the negotiations further, it was subsequently disclosed that there are dozens of stockpiles of Minolta Vectis APS cameras scattered around the Osaka countryside, waiting to be refurbished and returned to the US.

In a related story, NASA announced that it plans to supply all future astronauts with Minolta-branded cameras exclusively. "If Minolta was good enough for John Glenn," said one thrift-minded NASA engineer, "they're probably okay for everybody else, too. And they're a lot cheaper than Nikons or Hasselblads."

It's satire, folks. An April Fools' Day joke. The Minolta 110 Zoom pictured above is a real thing. Sadly, none of the rest is true, except maybe the part about the secret closet in Sakai. And John Glenn did carry a camera manufactured by Minolta into space; however, it bore the Ansco brand name.

—Jon Sienkiewicz