HISTORY
MINOLTA
Minolta Co., Ltd. (ミノルタ, Minoruta) was a Japanese manufacturer of cameras, camera accessories, photocopiers, fax machines, and laser printers.
Minolta Co., Ltd., which is also known simply as Minolta, was founded in Osaka, Japan, in 1928 as Nichi-Doku Shashinki Shōten (日独写真機商店, meaning Japanese-German camera shop).
It made the first integrated autofocus 35 mm SLR camera system.
In 1931, the company adopted its final name, an acronym for "Mechanism, Instruments, Optics, and Lenses by Tashima". In 1933, the brand name first appeared on a camera, a copy of the Plaubel Makina simply called "Minolta".
In 2003, Minolta merged with Konica to form Konica Minolta.
On 19 January 2006, Konica Minolta announced that it was leaving the camera and photo business, and that it would sell a portion of its SLR camera business to Sony as part of its move to pull completely out of the business of selling cameras and photographic film.
-Wikipedia-
- 1958 September: First planetarium in Hyogo (Japan); model S
- 1959 September: model I
- 1966 May: model MS-10
- 1968 January: model MO-6
- 1969 April: model MS-15
- 1969 December: model MO-6P
- 1971 November: model MS-8
- 1971 November: model MO-6R
- 1978 September: model MS-18 AT
- 1978 September: model MS-6
- 1980 March: model MS-20 AT
- 1981 March: model MS-10 AT
- 1981 March: model MS-15 AT
- 1985 March: model INFINIUM
- 1987 July: model INFINIUM + all sky movie
- 1989 September model INFINIUM α
- 1990 March model INFINIUM β
- 1992 March model INFINIUM γ
- 1992 September model Iwerksphere
- 1994 March model INFINIUM β + Iwerksphere
- 1994 March model Cosmoleap
- 1995 February model Cosmoleap 8
- 1995 March model Cosmoleap 8 + Space Simulator
- 1995 August model Cosmoleap 10
- 1996 March model INFINIUM γ II
- 1997 March model INFINIUM α II
- 1997 March model INFINIUM γ II + Digistar II
- 1998 April model Laserscan
- 1999 June model MS-Sakubougetsu
- 2001 March model Laserscan + Skyvision
- 2001 April model MEDIAGLOBE
- 2003 May model Geministar β II + Skyvision
- 2004 June model INFINIUM L
- 2005 March model Geministar II
- 2005 March model DigitalSky
- 2005 March model SUPER MEDIAGLOBE
- 2006 March model Geministar III (S)
- 2006 March model Geministar III (L)
- 2006 April model INFINIUM + DigitalSky
- 2008 January model MEDIAGLOBE II
- 2009 March model SUPER MEDIAGLOBE II
- 2011 March model Universarium IX + DigitalSky 2
- 2011 April model MEDIAGLOBE LITE
- 2011 June model MEDIAGLOBE III
- 2012 December model SKYMAX DSII-R2
- 2013 March model Geministar IV
- 2015 March model MEDIAGLOBE Σ
- 2017 October model Geministar Σ (INFINIUM Σ + MEDIAGLOBE Σ)
- 2018 March model Geministar Σ (Cosmoleap Σ + MEDIAGLOBE Σ)
- 2020 January model MEDIAGLOBE Σ SE
KONICA
In 1873, Rokusaburo Sugiura sold photographic and lithographic material in Tokyo under the name Konishiya Rokubeiten: these were the beginnings of the Konica corporation.
In 1903, Konica manufactured the first Japanese cameras.
Konica will open its first American subsidiary in Philadelphia in 1956.
In 1928, Kazuo Tashima created Nichi-Doku Shashinki Shoten, a German-Japanese company which later gave birth to Minolta Co.
The company's first photocopier was manufactured in 1960.
In the meantime, Konica would manufacture the first autofocus SLR camera in 1985 and Minolta the first desktop laser printer in 1990.
In 2006, Konica Minolta ceased photography and definitively refocused on its industrial and office activities.
-Wikipedia-
The two companies were merged in 2003.
In 2019, Konica Minolta's planetarium subsidiary acquires RSA Cosmos (France).
RSA Cosmos supplies and continues to develop the "SkyExplorer" astronomical navigation software. In Japan, Konica-Minolta offers the hybrid solution under the name "Infinium Σ SE" (SE for "SkyExplorer")