In October, Jean-Christophe Thiry, the President of Tamron France, spoke with Phototrend and said that the company was “focused on our strength with zooms.” The language sounded as though it closed the door on primes, but Thiry and Tamron have clarified this isn’t the case.
At the time, Thiry said that Tamron’s strategy was to differentiate and offer zooms that did not exist elsewhere. That was the “core” of its business.
“It would obviously be interesting to announce lenses like 24mm f/1.4, 35mm f/1.4, or even an 85mm f/1.2, these are lenses that make you dream. But today, from a commercial point of view, there are already a large number of players who offer this type of optics and we are rather trying to play the agility card. So we are focusing on our strengths with our zooms,” he said.
That language, especially when translated from French, sounds more like a firm closure than the company’s actual stance on the matter, it turns out.
“Thank you for the opportunity to clarify the misinterpretation of my comments made to Phototrend at Salon De Photo this past September,” Thiry tells PetaPixel over email.
“While I stated, ‘we are focused on zooms,’ this statement was meant to address the products we have introduced recently, excluding of course the new 90mm f/2.8 Macro recently announced and due to ship in December,” he continues.
“What I wished to convey is that concentrating on zoom lenses has been our recent strategy as we look to boost our lens selection in the mirrorless market and leverage our ingenuity and our expertise producing unique, exciting, and useful zoom lenses to the mirrorless market across several camera mounts. Tamron will always consider what the market is demanding and react accordingly. To what extent Tamron will introduce additional primes has not been disclosed to me, and since I am not in a position to definitively comment on what products will be introduced in the future, I did not and could not indicate that we would not be introducing prime lenses in the future. My comment was misinterpreted, and I appreciate this opportunity to clear it up.”
Thiry’s comments mirror PetaPixel‘s understanding of how camera and lens companies, based in Japan, typically work with their international counterparts. Tamron Japan’s plan for lens development is likely a closely guarded secret even inside the company. That, and Tamron’s recent 90mm f/2.8 Macro, is also a good example of how the company will still produce prime lenses should there be a place in the market for them.
In short, Thiry isn’t able to say that Tamron is done making primes because he isn’t privy to that information. For those hoping to see a revival of Tamron’s outstanding prime lenses from the DSLR era, there is still hope.
Image credits: Tamron
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