That effort lead to the production of versatile and sensitive CdS-sensor-based light meters, a quite successful chapter in the companys history.

It produced cameras for many film formats, from 16mm film to medium format.

Most branches of the company were related to optics: the copier branch, the exposure meter branch, etc.

Minolta was succeeded by Konica Minolta after the merger with Konica in 2003.

The merged company sold its remaining camera interests to Sony in 2006; the Minolta A lens mount lives on in Sonys current line of DSLRs.

A plant was built in Mukogawa (), in the prefecture of Hygo ().

The first camera produced by the company was the Nifcarette released in 1929.

It was followed by the Nifcaklapp and Nifcasport folding cameras and by the Nifca-Dox strut-folder, all taking film plates or pack film.

At this early period, all the cameras were directly advertised and distributed by the company, which was using a round logo with the letters N, D, P H and C o assembled inside a circle, surely for N ichi D oku Ph oto Co mpany.

In 1930, a strike occurred in the Mukogawa plant, whose director was Willy Heilemann.

Heilemann dismissed all the strikers and opposed Tashima, who was favouring more moderate measures.

The cameras were still distributed by the company itself for a couple of years, and the Sirius and Arcadia were also distributed by Misuzu Shkai as the Lomax and Eaton.

Molta later entered an agreement with the Tokyo-based distributor Asanuma Shkai, and the Sirius and Arcadia plate cameras were replaced by the Happy (whose brand name was owned by Asanuma).

The Asanuma company would distribute the Happy and Minolta cameras and assume all the advertising until 1945.

Downloaded from the IPDL, in accordance to the IPDL policies.

A round MTS logo appeared at the same time, perhaps standing for M olta T a s hima or M inolta T a s hima.

The Semi Minolta was announced at the very end of 1934 and sold from 1935.

It was the second or third 4.56cm camera made in Japan.

In 1936, the company created the subsidiary Nippon Kgaku Kikai Kenkyjo (, meaning Japanese Opto-mechanical Research Institute) in the city of Amagasaki (), in the Hygo prefecture, to manufacture the bakelite cameras such as the Minolta Vest, Minolta Six and Baby Minolta.

This subsidiary was soon merged into the main company, and became the Amagasaki plant.

In February 1937, the company opened a third plant in the city of Sakai (), in the Osaka prefecture.

This association became so close that many customers believed that the Minolta cameras were made by Asanuma; 17 the agreement lasted until the end of the war, but the two companies retained some commercial contacts for some time afterwards.

The civilian camera production was stopped around 1943.

At about that time, the company apparently made one or more prototypes of an interchangeable-lens TLR camera, which was the first 66 TLR in the world to have interchangeable lenses.

This camera was equipped with a Rokkor 753.5 that was the first Japanese coated lens commercially available, and also the first lens made by the company for civilian use.

The company also absorbed the optical section of the Toyokawa Navy Arsenal (Aichi prefecture), which became the Toyokawa () plant in November 1946.

The Memo of 1949 was Minoltas first 35mm camera, again a sophisticated bakelite camera which already had a rapid film advance lever.

Throughout the 1950s, the range consisted of TLR cameras, 4.56 folders, 35mm viewfinder and rangefinder cameras and 16mm subminiature cameras.

In 1959 Chiyoda started to produce photocomposing machines, copiers, and special projectors.

Some of these products are still (2007) produced by its successor Konica Minolta.

In 1962 the company name became Minolta Camera K.K.

Minolta Camera Co.), unified with the brand name.

A significant camera launch of that year was the introduction of Minoltas first SLR with built-in CdS meter, the Minolta SR-7.

Minolta Af 35 Big Finder Manual