What Thom says does make sense in the way he says it, but Nikon releasing a Z30 and black Zfc this year while a large part of their user base continues to hold out waiting for something midrange to be released is causing a lot of people to lose patience. Whether it leads to frustration or them jumping to another brand, neither is favorable. With the holiday season approaching, they would likely do well releasing an updated Z6 which appeals to many people and is still cheap enough that it would be bought for the holidays. If the next camera comes in spring, it really would need to be cameras and they would need to be great releases. There needs to be a smaller, performance oriented body and a great midlevel consumer body that will generate excitement. It would also be nice to see a performance DX body and a high resolution FX option. They also need to get the rest of their lens roadmap lenses released. If they can do those things in the next six months, they will jump ahead of the competition. If they drag it out, the competition might stay ahead. This of course is just my non expert opinion.
It is obvious Nikon's Imaging group is juggling R&D and capacities of its factory lines to meet the markets demands across parallel product lines. The Z9 is presumably pinning down skilled assembly lines in Thailand, at least (although demand may be easing off). Yet Nikon is also making the Z30, Z5 and other 2 entry Z MILCs aimed at young and/or entry hobbyists, many of whom prioritize video. [EDIT: Thom Hogan doesn't even touch on the latter in his
recent post. Instead stating, "So these increases are coming from selling more Z6/Z7/Z9/D850/D6 type of product and less Zfc/Z30/Z50/Z5/Dxxx types...." The facts are the average selling price of DX MILCs are hinger than entry DSLRs (most of these Nikon has stopped selling recently, anyway). Nikon has to meet demand at both ends, which is the life support as young hobbyists grow up into established hobbyists or Pros who then afford the higher-enf Z products...]
Then there's the finite rate of assembly and production of the exotic telephotos, particularly where demand has outstripped capacity; not least if it's exceeded the projected production of glass elements. It is impossible to fast track the annealing these. Component shortages are the other big obstacle to increase production of these high tech products, cameras particularly.
The parallel production strategy is hinted at in Nikon's stated aims in Operational Direction [images of pages refer above - 2022 IR report} is to "appeal to video creators.....strengthen products and services responding to young hobbyists..." alongside aiming at the top tier markets, including "...deploying the popular advanced features present in our flagship Z9 model to other models, as well".
To date, the growth of the Z system appears to have chosen to first get out the Ultrawide and standard primes, the triad of best-in-reviews f2.8S Dragons etc, with the pair of TCs released with the 70-200 f2.8S. All along since late 2018, the Z6 and Z7 lines have worked very well for events, content creators, landscape Pros etc. Over the past year, we have seen the four Z-telephoto primes, 100-400 S with the Z9. With the 70-200 f2.8S, it's these most recent highend products, which have clinched the status of the Z System for Wildlife and Sports.
But as you say, the prosumer MILCs are missing but likely to be the next cameras Nikon releases with the 200-600 (finally). Personally, I see these announced within the next few months. Thereafter, it's intriguing to consider whatever additional lenses Nikon plans to expand the Z system from the current committed 39 to expending to a more complete system of 50+ over the next 50 months.
And last but by no means least, we can continue to see new releases by Nikon to improve its profile in the video market
Au CP+ 2019, nous avons rencontré deux ingénieurs de chez Nikon : Kazuharu Imafuji et Satoshi Yamazaki. Nous avons pu revenir avec eux sur la monture Z annoncée en 2018, les avantages qu’elle procure et parler également de vidéo, un domaine où Nikon souhaite faire sa place.
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