Canon

Canon Inc. is a Japanese company whose businesses span office and production printing, cameras and lenses, medical imaging systems, network video surveillance, and semiconductor and display manufacturing equipment. It traces its origins to the Precision Optical Instruments Laboratory, founded in Roppongi, Tokyo, in 1933 to develop cameras. Precision Optical Industry, Co., Ltd. was incorporated in 1937, became Canon Camera Co., Inc. in 1947 and took the name Canon Inc. in 1969.

Its group companies include Canon Medical Systems (formerly Toshiba Medical Systems, acquired in 2016), the network camera maker Axis Communications (2015), the video management software developer Milestone Systems (2014) and Canon Production Printing (formerly Océ).

Canon built its first camera, the Kwanon, as a prototype in 1934 and introduced the Hansa Canon in 1936. It launched the EOS autofocus SLR system with EF lenses in 1987 and the EOS 5D Mark II, a full-frame SLR that recorded Full HD video, in 2008. Canon entered motion picture production with the Cinema EOS System of cameras and lenses in 2011, and introduced the EOS R system and RF mount in 2018. Its K-35 cinema lenses received an Academy Award in 1977.