I want to purchase a Prosumer camera. I like the XH A1S, but not sure about the HDV format. I have been reviewing the Panasonic HMC150, which seems like a nice prosumer AVCHD camcorder, but the lack of zoom (13x for a $3500 camera) really is a turn off. When does Canon usually announce new products? I am hoping that maybe they will put out a prosumer AVCHD camcorder comparable to the XH A1S.

There wasn't anything new announced at IBC, earlier this month, so probably put off till NAB in April?

I think IBC must be going down the toilet. I don't think Sony had a stand there this year. But that week, they released a new Standard Definition camcorder - to replace the old PD170. It's called the PD175! Woohooo!!!
I think manufacturers are saying, they can only do this once a year.
Consumer stuff in January at CES. Pro stuff at NAB in April.

Not sure I would agree. IBC has grown to a venue to launch new products, from being a delivery of NAB announcements venue. None of the major camera brands launched a new camera this September, as mark Schubin pointed out in his camera focussed item plenty of smaller international firms did come up with interesting new cameras though.

Almost every year in the past five years there has been a major vendor that skipped the show to focuss on its own events, and sofar they all returned, Panasonic, Avid, Snell & Wilcox, are some of the notable names.

I don't know, I have never gone to IBC, but I was kind of hoping for some exciting news. At NAB, there wasn't a whole lot of new (ground breaking) product launches either I guess, but at least all the companies attended, and there were some model updates and future technology prototypes that had never been shown before.
I remember Sony launched the PD-170 at IBC (it also was a minor update from the PD-150), now they release the PD-175 at the time of IBC.
The more innovative FX1, Z1, EX1 and EX3 were all released at NAB I believe. I am led to believe Sony and Canon will have stuff worth noting at NAB 2010. A rumor going around is Canon wants to compete with RED. So we will see what happens in April.

That would make sense, both a shouldermount and a tactical shooter. Owner/operator and independent newscrews are Canons current market niches, so...