Web Analytics RiceHigh's Pentax Blog: NEWS: Mr. Jun Hirakawa Now Works for Tamron and Mr. Blurry Cameraphone has Left Pentax China

Monday, July 08, 2013

NEWS: Mr. Jun Hirakawa Now Works for Tamron and Mr. Blurry Cameraphone has Left Pentax China

See this latest post and thread at the Chinese Xitek Pentax Forum, these are told:-

1. It is confirmed that Mr. Jun Hirakawa, who was (forced) early retired by Hoya back to 2010, is now working for Tamron and below is the evidence:-



The above is a Japanese patent application in 2013 which shows that the inventor of the lens is Jun and the intellectual property owner company is Tamron!

Btw, for those who might not know who Mr. Hirakawa is. He was/is the optical engineer and designer of the FA28/2.8, FA35/2 and FA43 and 77 Limited lenses, FA*24/2, FA*85/1.4, FA*80-200/2.8, as well as the DA10-17 Fisheye, DA14/2.8, DA40/2.8 Limited, DA*55/1.4 and etc. (Amongst those I own nearly half of the above great Pentax lenses myself!)

2. The following quoted picture from the Japanese Pentax forum shows and summarised whereabout of many of those famous ex-Pentax optical and camera engineers. In fact, most of them had left the company and are now employed by the competitor companies like Nikon, Sony and Tamron:-



3. After years of (hard and excellent!) works for the Pentax (Shanghai) China as the marketing manager, Mr. Blurry Cameraphone (Mr. Jopy Yang) has finally left the company. :-( Via a Xitek post in the above thread here.

In fact, his fate is just like Ned Bunnell, it was widely believed by many Pentax users Ned was forced to leave the company one year after Ricoh's takeover. However, the Ricoh-core replacement of Ned is just a pure salesman who knows nothing about Pentax but seriously needed help from Pentaxians, which is utter sad afterall! >:-(

Just a few months before, I actually heard via a third person who were close to Mr. Yang about his disappointment on the latest development of the Pentax line and there was no concrete plan of any for better development of the system. Maybe that was the reason he left the company himself? Or, he was forced to do so??


Old Reference Posts:-

False Rumour - Jun Hirakawa is NOT Back!

The Very Different Fates of Two ex-AOC Top Optical Engineers

Some "Lost Stories" About the Three FA Limited Lenses

Ned Bunnell is (Forced) to Retire so Suddenly and Urgently!

Comments (9)

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Yes, Hoya has swept off many senior and higher payroll staff, leaving younger ones, with lower pay. However, that is maybe better for the brand in the long run because Pentax needs fresh ideas looking into towards the future.
Re Jun Hirakawa, well, if he works for Tamron and Tamron makes lenses for Pentax cameras, then we are still enjoying master Jun's ideas, right? :)
Your last comment about mr Blurry sounds a bit forced but in reality that story means nothing to any user, same as Ned's departure. Sometimes you can accept that some people want to have time with families and retire from corporate culture. They leave jobs to young and energetic ones. 
Speaking of that, one day you may also retire from all of this :)
Dan Johnson's avatar

Dan Johnson · 608 weeks ago

How stupid of a child are you to take this as a sign that Ricoh is making great advancements in R & D, they don't own Tamron and (if you beleive your other FanBoys) Tokina (who has made Pentax lenses in the past) has no plans of making new lenses in K-Mount in the near future. Like a lot of fools you FanBoys label Pentaxians like myself (who have the K-1000 they bought when it was a new model, my MZ-S, K-10, K-20, K-5, and K-5iiS) boat rockers. Salesmen aren't going to make better cameras (even though it's your great opinion that out with the old in with the new is always a good thing) so just put another Leica lens on whatever Ricoh sells you at a bargin then put your head in the sand again.
Dan, I personally don't give a damn for MZ or K1000 or Pentax products of 50 years ago. I have few of them, but they are historic artefacts. Nor I don't care that some poor lens engineer's name has been dragged around in Pentax rumours for years — I feel sorry for him not because he was laid of by Hoya, but because he was mauled to death by dumb rumour sites.
Let them be in peace. I think that Pentax needs young and energetic people willing to risk and do bold moves, and I hate to be fed with all the same nonsense over and over again served by those who have no clue about future roadmaps and brand development.
Dan Johnson's avatar

Dan Johnson · 608 weeks ago

No ZIT Farm has made big advances in Pentax R&D, your are to immature to realize the obvious. When you graduate High School you'll look back on this and claim you made Ricoh great by being a loyal customer for over a year, but if you can find someone inteligant to read this to you instead of your bedtime story you'll see, I'm not advocating going back to an old design, rather, I'd prefer to see Pentax R & D come up with some noteworthy innovations instead of fixating on customers who's main concern is how cheap can I get it if I wait until Ricoh has to unload it's old stock. Your Just wait and see or Maybe someday, just hasn't cutt it for years now, but 2010 is before your time evidently.
What kind of discussion is this???
Lars
A week ago I thought I had discovered some nice Pentax-oriented blog/forum named ricehigh, but after this week i'm already sick of it. Such a negativism around here... unbelievable... I don't know and don't care how much fotographic experience and history the people around here have, but I suggest that you all take your -whatever brand- photo gear and get down to the essentials of photography again, which is taking pictures, and have fun with that!
2 replies · active 608 weeks ago
What I have reported are all factual. If you feel that they are negative, it is just because the news themselves are really bad.
Yeah, right. You're misinterpreting everything as "bad news".
Ned Bunnell was hopeless anyway no tears around here, he just got old and retired I don't think he was forced out.
Ricoh well they've no talent left, so good luck to Tamron for giving the guy a job. Let's be blunt most K mount users buy Tamron stuff to beef up the bad lens range anyway

But neither Tamron or Sigma are supporting Pentax with some newer lenses, K mount is slowly dying and Ricoh are putting more nails in the coffin with their price hikes

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