News Ricoh to buy Pentax?

I've seen this story in a few places now. After some initial raised eyebrows it kinda makes sense. Ricoh does compacts very well, Pentax not so well. One would hope if this comes to pass that we don't see any simple badge engineering exercises and that the two companies maintain individuality in their product lines whilst sharing common componentry to cut R&D and development costs.
 
According to Digital home.

"Ricoh will pay Hoya 10 billion yen ($124 million) to acquire its Pentax operation."

"Hoya, which merged with Pentax in 2008 in a deal valued at $770 million ... "

Sounds like someones loss is another person's gain.
 
Hey guys, not sure if anyone's seen the "open letter to pentax customers",

here: Open letter from Hoya to valued Pentax customers and partners | Photo Rumors

So Pentax will stay as a seperate identity the way i understand it, so the products will still be pentax branded.

I'm guessing Ricoh will bring out a k-mount GXR unit - which would be very interesting (having used my girlfriends GXR I'm actually very impressed with it) as they also have an leica m-mount coming out
 
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