Natural disasters are a part of life, but the Kumamoto Earthquake practically brought the entire camera production industry to a halt, with several camera launches being delayed and many other cameras being unobtainable since roughly 70% of all sensors are manufactured in the Sony Kumamoto Factory. Being located less than 20 kilometers from the epicenter of the quake was quite devastating and watching the video above I am shocked Sony was able to recover so quickly. Their clean rooms were completely exposed to unfiltered air and dust from the quake. The cleanup effort must have been unimaginable.
I wonder if Sony will try to open a more strategically located factory in the future in order to maintain production levels if such an event were to occur again. It would be logical to be able to shift manufacturing to an alternative facility in order to reduce the cleanup cost and pressure in the future if they were to experience another quake. The affect of the quake on their financial results and the industry could be mitigated, with proper planning.
via imaging-resource
