Despite its leading position and size as a name brand camera manufacturer, Canon apparently can’t get a grip on its supply chain.
The company has announced that shipping delays will cause new orders for the EOS R5 Mark II to be backlogged by as many as 6 months for anyone ordering today.
According to Canon, the reason for this is a global supply parts shortage combined with a nearly boilerplate excuse of “more orders than expected” contributing to the backlog.
While there’s some plausibility to the idea of Canon dealing with parts supply issues with providers and external supply chains outside of its direct control, the idea of too many orders seems just a bit absurd.
A company with the history, experience, resources and anticipatory abilities of Canon must be joking to claim that it somehow couldn’t prepare in advance for producing enough units of a camera it had so thoroughly promoted before release.
You’d almost think they were a Kickstarter venture, just finding its feet, instead of a 90-year-old legend in camera development.
Whatever the case may be, Canon claims that older orders are shipping correctly and that the potential 6-month delay applies only to new orders made as of very recently.
Canon’s statement explains,
“Currently, we are experiencing delivery delays for the following products due to more orders than expected and also due to the impact of global parts supply. We apologize to our customers and business partners for the inconvenience. Products are scheduled to be shipped one after another, but it is expected that the new camera body EOS R5 Mark II will take a long time to ship. We apologize
again for keeping our eager customers waiting for such a long time. We will continue to take measures to ensure a stable product supply so that we can deliver the products as soon as possible. We appreciate your understanding.”
The EOS R5 Mark II isn’t the only device being affected by these production and delivery problems according to Canon.
For example, buyers who order a new Canon EOS R1, or one of Canon’s newer RF200-800mm f/6.3-9 IS USM lenses might also have to wait “longer than usual” to obtain them. The same applies to a number of other products from the company according to a list (In Japanese) provided by Canon.
Canon however doesn’t mention specific wait times for these other products. It does so only for the R5 Mark II.
The bottom line: If you want a Canon EOS R5 Mark II of your own (and it is indeed one excellent camera from the brand), you should have ordered it weeks ago.
If you didn’t do that, then to get one as soon as possible, your second best time to order is now, even though you can expect it by Spring of next year at the latest.
