Size of Telescope Market

On another group, we were speculating about the size of the telescope market in the U.S. and worldwide. I've heard guesses as low as $10m and as high as several hundred million dollars (annually). Frankly, I don't have a clue, but if anyone does have a good guess, educated or otherwise, they probably read this group.

Any ideas? Smaller than most would think? Larger?

Randy

Meade Instruments is publicly traded (NASDEQ:MEAD). Go to their web site, navigate to Investor Relations, then have a read of their latest SEC filings and their annual report. They talk all about the market - including their market share. In FY 2003, that was over $110 million (page 12 of latest annual report)...so I think the estimate of $10 million is a little conservative.

What really surprised me was to read that the Meade 'advanced' telescopes amount to only 3% of what they ship! (see page 5 of the latest annual report)