All our industrial cameras have a minimum life cycle of 7 years after market introduction. The graph below shows the typical product life cycle stages of an industrial camera.
Market introduction of an industrial camera
When a camera is released it has the latest generation sensor. In almost all cases the latest generation sensor is more light senstive and has less noise than previous generation sensors. Therefore a better image quality can be achieved.
Check for newer alternatives
After 3-7 years, sensor manufacturers will release a new version of the sensor or a sensor from a different brand might have better imaging performance. Therefore during this period it's important to check if there are other camera types available that have a newer image sensor.
EOL Notification
Unfortunately cameras do go End of Life (EOL). Sometimes this can be due to very low volume demand, however in most cases the reason is that the sensor manufacturer announces that the camera sensor will go EOL. This has an impact on all camera manufacturers that are using this image sensor in their cameras. As soon as the sensormanufacturer informs the camera manufacturer that the sensor will go end of life, we will inform our customers that have bought this camera during the last 2 years. We will also do our best to have a replacement type that replaces the current camera type perfectly. The current camera can still be bought for at least 1 year.
Last time buy
The last time buy date is the last date we can process new orders for this camera type. Often customers will place a volume order with multiple deliveries over 1-2 years (call of order). After the call of order the camera can't be produced anymore and the camera is EOL.
Conclusion product life cycle management of an industrial camera
To summarize:
Every camera is at least available for 7 years after market introduction (but often much longer)
After EOL announcement you can still order the camera for 1 year
After EOL announcement you have a maximum of 3 years to upgrade you machine with a newer camera model, when you make use of our last time buy in combination with a call of order.
