PENTAX

1919 - Otsuka, Tokyo. It was this year when the history of PENTAX,
originally founded as Asahi Optical Joint Stock Co., began as a
manufacturer of lenses for eyeglasses. Following establishment, the
company made use of its uniquely developed lens polishing and
coating technologies in creating the first domestically produced
projection lenses, binoculars, and camera lenses. While improving
technical precision along with the increase of the number of products
manufactured, in 1952, the company released "Asahiflex l" - the first
domestically manufactured single-lens reflex camera. Starting with
the release of “Asahiflex l,” PENTAX grew from a lens manufacturer
into a brand that the world had their eyes on as a pioneer of
single-lens reflex cameras. Ever since, PENTAX continued to release
innovative products that were the first of their kind in not only Japan
but also the world.

To this day, amidst the rapidly changing world around the shapes of
cameras evolving hand-in-hand with the progression of technology
and how people interact with photographs, there is one thing that
PENTAX has kept to.

This one thing is the company's dedication to manufacturing in
"doing what others have never done." This passion has been inherite
through generations down to the current developers of PENTAX. All is
to expand the possibilities of creators.

Here, we will introduce the path that PENTAX has taken together with products released in the past.