Cannon Singapore Pte Ltd marketing manager (camera and video division) Toshiyuki Ishii told The Financial Express

that Canon was in the process of conducting a viability study to gauge the camera penetration possibilities and potential of the Indian market. ``If the study finds our plan feasible, we will set up a camera plant in India in two years,'' he said.

Regarding the location of the plant, he said, ``We are looking at a couple of places in India and Bangalore stands a bright chance.'' Canon has a copier manufacturing plant in Noida and is checking out the possibility of getting a legal license to set up its camera manufacturing facility on the premises of the copier plant.

However, there could be some legal bottlenecks as Canon's Noida plant was registered as a copier manufacturing plant, Ishii said. ``If we can manage to get a governmentsanction, the initial investment in the plant will be only $3 million,'' he added.

He said initially the Indian plant would cater only to the domestic sector and would start exporting cameras to neighbouring countries like Pakistan and Sri Lanka later.

Commenting on the market potential in India in terms of cameras, he said currently India's demand for cameras was around 5,00,000 units a year, with Canon accounting for 23.06 per cent of the country's total camera business. However, Canon's share was expected to grow considerably if it could offer world-class cameras at affordable prices. Currently, Canon has camera-making plants in Japan, Taiwan, Malaysia and China.

Canon claims to have cornered 90 per cent of the press photography segment in Finland, Sweden and Malaysia. In the SLR camera segment, Canon has around 50 per cent of the market in Germany and UK, Ishii said.