Well,
I dug out the issue of Foto Magazin in which I read about problems
with Pentax name. It is an issue from june 99, released in tribute to
50 years anniversary of the magazine. Inside, they write about all
the milestones in photo industry during this 50 years since 1949. For
year 52 stands that lawful name dispute with Zeiss Ikon from
Stuttgart triggered the company from Dresden (which belonged to east
Germany at the time) to introduce new name for their cameras: export
versions were all named Pentacon (derived from Pentaprisma Contax).
So, according to the magazine, they introduced the name Pentacon few
years before 1957. And, in year 1966 it is said that only after Asahi
Pentax settled the lawsuit with Pentacon Dresden, it was possible to
buy Spotmatic in Germany as well.
Matjaz
>Seth wrote:
> This doesn't make sence. As near as I can tell, Pentacon was the
> name use for cameras produced in Dresden in East Germany, and was
> used starting in 1964. The first use of Pentax name occured in
> 1957. If I'm not mistaken, Pentacon name was used because Carl
> Zeiss objected to east german "Contaxes".
>
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