Its sad to see Kenwood saying goodbye to VK, although to be fair they have been lagging in development of products for a while, and the interesting products like the Dstar handie for some reason were never brought into Aus.
If it is due to lack of sales of AR gear, their lack of advertisements and pushing their gear locally might have something to do with it.
I don't recall seeing an ad by them in any print or electronic media for quite a while, nor presence at hamfests. Instead unlike Icom and Yaesu locally, perhaps they have been relying on dealers to advertise their gear or people to see overseas mags and bulletins.
When they merged with JVC it all started to go wrong in VK.
I phoned them a few years ago after the JVC thing and the girl who answered asked me "what model camera is it"?
Jan Sabura the engineer/tech who joined them in sydney probably around 1983 or 84 approx was very helpful but had a hard time getting permission to get a new filter board for my 590s which was under warranty...
The boss [ex jvc] did not want to know about the small ham market in VK.
I think strictly had problems getting stuff at times... ?
All gone now...
vk6ro
e&oe