Aaton Digital in liquidation

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briandrys1

Member
Aaton, known for their 16mm and 35mm film cameras and in recent years the Cantar audio recorders, has gone into liquidation. There was an Aaton digital camera project, which was cancelled because of difficulties with the sensor.

https://www.aaton.com/
 
Ack, that's a shame. I wonder if someone will license the brand to keep it alive. With the current surge in 16mm shooting, I would have thought they might have had a chance to resurrect the XTR-Prod in updated form, but then again maybe there are enough old cameras floating around still. That and the 35-III were great handheld cameras particularly for doc work. I spent a couple of seasons of TV in the eyepiece of the XTR.

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IDK much about the company and could be wrong about this, but it seems like selling film cameras and $18,000 audio recorders is a tough business today.

The digital camera project is a shame...that's what I picture they should have been working on but it's almost impossible for anyone to enter Japan's territory.

Meaning I don't think a company who doesn't sell hundreds of products in different areas wants to make a camera to sell for $2K, $3K, etc that has to compete with the R5s and a7SIIIs.

And if it's more money than that then that's even tougher because who's going to buy it.
 
Saw this pop-up on some of the audio boards about a week ago. It’s almost never good when we lose companies that played storied roles in forming this industry. I saw what could possibly be described as maybe wishful comments or speculation that maybe Sound Devices, Sonosax, Black Magic or even Zoom or DJI would come in and buy them.
 
Aaton stopped making film cameras about 10 years ago. They're still used, so there will be a demand for existing spares. The digital camera was high end - Alexa territory, and it fell apart because of issues that the sensor manufacturer didn't wish to pursue.

The audio recorders are high end, so it's a small but extremely demanding market. See here: https://vimeo.com/133169726
 
Yikes! That's tough, I had just recently watched a video about them trying to develop a digital sensor but, yeah, it's going to be really difficult to come in out of nowhere because sensor design is seemingly becoming a very closed door business unless you can build something off of an already made sensor, especially as we go to 8K+ resolutions.
 
Doug Bee said:
I thought Tansvideo bought Aaton? Is it them that are bust or is just the Aaton brand?
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According to Wiki: "Transvideo acquired Aaton through its holding company ITHAKI."

The statement on the Aaton website says:

"We are sad to announce that the Aaton-Digital adventure ended on February 15, 2024 by a court judgment.
Three years of covid-19 followed by a long strike by cinema professionals have profoundly affected our sales. Faced with no prospects, the company was liquidated.
We thank all our users and partners for their commitment and passion during the ten years we have gone through together."

That sounds like Aaton Digital alone was liquidated.
 
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