Nikon announces Japanese factory to close

In another nail in the coffin of the point-and-shoot camera industry, Nikon have announced that one of their largest factories in China will close.

Opened in 2002, the factory in Wuxi City, Jiangsu Province, “manufactured digital cameras and lens units for digital cameras.” 

Compact camera sales have long been in decline in an era of ever more powerful smartphone cameras. It appears Nikon's decision is aimed at consolidating a focus towards more lucrative product lines - SLR and other professional-level product lines that have larger profit margins, and the company has gone as far as to lay blame squarely on smartphones:

Since 2009, sales of compact cameras have been declining rapidly, however new data from seems to suggest camera sales overall are stabilising.

2017 marked a 1.7 percent decline to a 7.1 percent growth over the previous year’s sales. In comparison, 2016 showed a decline of between 31.7 percent to 14 percent.