Sept 10, 2001

Sales of Taiwan made digital cameras will have the opportunity to hit the 1 million unit mark for the first time in 2001, the Market Intelligence Center (MIC) of the government-supported Institute for Information Industry (III) said in Taipei.

Despite most other information technology products suffering sharp declines, sales of Taiwan made digital cameras, especially the 1.3 megapixel types, saw growth rates of 158.3% and 168.9% in production volume and value respectively, compared with the same period a year ago. Taiwan delivered about 4.94 million digital cameras during the January-June period alone. Over the past few months however, the price of digital cameras continued declining, but most local makers in the line still continued the mass production of their 1.3 million pixel models (which are considered "high end" by Taiwan standards) as expected.

In 2000, Taiwan's digital camera makers concentrated on the production of low-end models such as 350,000 pixel types. However, this situation changed since the beginning of this year as most local counterparts began to manufacture 1.3 megapixel models, paving the way for sharp growth rates both in production and value.

MIC expects that sales of Taiwan-made digital cameras will grow sharply in the second half. Sales will reach between 10 million and 10.49 million units for the year, representing a world market share of 44.5%.