More about History

The EP450Z became the world’s first copier to feature a stepless zoom function. Compared with conventional copiers with fixed magnification/reduction ratios, this product boasted outstanding operability. It was also equipped with sophisticated functions, such as automatic document feeder and automatic paper selection. The EP450Z enjoyed great success worldwide for its user friendliness and highly functional design.

The company developed the world’s first aspheric plastic lens for compact disc (CD) players by leveraging its aspheric plastic lens technology for cameras. In 1984, it started to supply the product to CD player manufacturers. Later, its application was expanded to various optical discs. A multi-disc support system capable of reading CDs, DVDs, and Blu-ray discs using a single lens was also developed. Today, the business in this field is among the largest in the world.

The company became the first in the world to offer a single-lens reflex camera with a professional-quality autofocus function when it introduced the α-7000 (MAXXUM 7000 in the U.S., Minolta 7000 in Europe),. This camera enjoyed explosive sales worldwide. Following this phenomenal success, a host of single-lens reflex autofocus cameras were launched in succession by various other companies. Previously, single-lens reflex cameras had been difficult to use and were designed only for professionals and camera enthusiasts, but then became user-friendly devices that allowed anyone to take clear photos easily.

The company marketed the CF70 (nicknamed LIMOS 70), a full-color digital copier that achieved outstanding image quality of 400 dpi based on the density rendering of 256 gradations for four colors per dot by using the proprietary laser intensity modulation system. In the same year, the company was awarded the Outstanding Technology Prize for this technology by the Society of Electrophotography of Japan.

In the 1990s, the company started to develop and sell paper suitable for inkjet printing of photographic images in anticipation of the future potential of the inkjet market. A large color inkjet printer for inkjet textile printing on fabrics was concurrently under development. In 1997, the company marketed the Konica Nassenger KS-1600, which attracted much public attention as a next-generation system by eliminating the need for printmaking, which was required in conventional textile printing, and quickly enabling the production of smaller quantities of diverse products.

A TAC film, which protects the polarizer, is one of the most important basic component materials of liquid crystal displays (LCDs), which are widely used as monitors in PCs, TVs, and mobile phones. In the mid-1990s, the company started to supply TAC films for LCD polarizers by leveraging its photographic film technology. In 2000, it opened a TAC film plant in Kobe to fully enter the TAC film business. The company’s TAC films were renowned for their thinness and uniformity, and demand for the films increased rapidly with the expansion of the market.

Polymerized toner, which achieved higher image quality while consuming less energy than conventional pulverized toner, was developed. At the end of 2000, Konica Minolta Supplies Manufacturing Co., Ltd. was established as a joint venture and started mass production. This was part of the partnership in the Business Technologies Business, which Konica Corporation and Minolta Co., Ltd. had announced in April of the same year. The company marketed the Konica Sitios 7035, a digital copier using the world’s first polymerized toner, in 2001 and a full-color copier using polymerized toner in 2002.