The Austrian broadcasting company ORF published an interview (in English) with Wolfgang Lutzky, the head of Nikon Austria.
When asked when Nikon would enter this market (i.e. mirrorless), Lutzky referred to the next presentation of financial results in March and mentioned that Nikon’s top managers might lay out their (mirrorless) plans at this occasion. FYI, Nikon’s financial year ends on March 31, 2011.
Furthermore, Lutzky noted that “The market of compact cameras with built-in lens is saturated and we expect that it will shrink next year”.
Mirrorless is rather unimportant in Austria so far, the market share is only one percent. Lutzky: “In Japan and Great Britain mirrorless has a market share of 10%, we see a huge potential here.”
According to this article Nikon was able to keep its number one position in Austria with a market share of 20,38% (152.011 units, total: 729.830 units sold – all kinds of cameras).
Lutzky further said that he does not think that the small compact cameras will be driven out of the market by mobile phones.
Thanks for the translation PTG!