Canon fire
Canon's Utsunomiya factory, where all of its high-end L series lenses are built
Over the past 30 years Canon has produced 90 million EOS cameras and 130 million EF lenses. It’s an astonishing figure which vindicates Canon’s decision back in the 1980s to abandon its popular FD mount in favour of the new electronic EF mount, rendering its then-entire, existing system obsolete at a stroke. Canon’s subsequent conquest and domination of the 35mm SLR market, followed by the DSLR market, is entirely due to that move, because the new mount laid the foundations for all the groundbreaking technology that followed.
To celebrate this milestone, AP was one of just two UK and four German publications invited to visit Canon’s global headquarters in Tokyo and tour its Utsunomiya lens plant, where its L-series lenses are made.
Canon’s Utsunomiya lens factory was built in 2005, and lies around an hour north of Tokyo by bullet train. It’s an imposing grey, low-rise slab of a building, surrounded by manicured lawns and car parks, all of which appear to be unblemished by even a speck of dust. Adjacent to the factory, on the same site, is the lens laboratory, where the research and development into new products
