Leica removes leader of camera business

The Leica M8, the company's first digital rangefinder camera, costs $5,500 without a lens.

(Credit: Leica)

Leica Camera, the German manufacturer of high-prestige but high-price photography equipment, has replaced its top executive, Steven Lee.

"The supervisory board of Leica Camera AG today removed Steven K. Lee as member and chairman of the board of management of Leica Camera AG with immediate effect," the company said in a brief statement Friday.

The board also named Andreas Kaufmann to be chairman of Leica Camera's board of management until February 28, 2009. He and Andreas Lobejaeger will lead the company jointly, the company said.

Leica was an influential brand in the 20th century, pioneering the use of 35mm film and supplying cameras to notable figures such as Henri Cartier-Bresson. However, the company has had some missteps making the transition from film to digital photography.

Leica has a cultlike following for its equipment, and the company sets prices accordingly. The M8, its first digital member of its decades-old M family, costs about $5,500 with no lens. And though its core components are upgradable, the price tag for a new shutter and LCD cover upgrade announced recently is $1,775--about the price of an entire Nikon D300 SLR.

According to a Leica representative quoted in Amateur Photographer, one of Kaufmann's first priorities will be to "review all options for the M system's future."

In an interview earlier this month with Amateur Photographer, Lee hinted that Leica is working on an M8 upgrade that would give it a full-frame image sensor, which is the size of a 35mm film image. Leica's M8 today, as well as most entry-level and midrange SLRs, use sensors about two thirds that size.

(Via 1001 Noisy Cameras.)

[ewelch]

Cult-like?

So, any company that sells only high-quality stuff to people who appreciate that quality means it's a cult? Like Apple? Are
Porsche-owners cult-like? How far does this go before you
water down the meaning?

Many fundamentalists who call Mormons cultists are more cult-
like than Mormons who are a rather diverse bunch compared to
the Fundamentalist Evangelicals who call them cultists. Maybe
it's time to nail down the meaning of cult?

Maybe Leica and Apple owners are more sect-like than cult-like?
I mean, a lot of quite normal people use Macs and Ms. And even
Rs! Many professionals use Leicas. Ansel Adams used a Leica R4
SLR in his last years. It was the heaviest camera he could carry,
so that was what he used. Is he a cultist?

In other words, give me a freaking break and knock-off the cult
language when you're talking about companies that decide
they'd rather make quality stuff in limited quantities, and leave
the cult labels for newly-minted groups with charismatic leaders
that haven't reached a more main-stream level of acceptance -
like Leica and Apple have long ago.

[William Crow]

You see it all the time here.

The news articles on cNet are consistently biased, all the while the
journalists think they aren't.

[scottst]

Tom Cruise for Leica!

I'm a Scientologist and I love Leica Cameras!

Go figure...

scott