In 1933, a small laboratory dedicated to making high-quality cameras was set up in a simple apartment room in the Roppongi area of Tokyo. Back then, all high-quality cameras were European with the majority coming from Germany. It was in this small room that young people with a big dream earnestly began their work to produce a high-quality Japanese camera, marking the beginning of Canon. Through hard work and an enterprising spirit, they succeeded in building a prototype, which was named Kwanon after the Buddhist Goddess of Mercy. Then in 1935, Japan's first-ever 35 mm focal-plane-shutter camera, the Hanza Canon, was born, marking the origins of the Canon brand.