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Oh, Kodak, once the acme of all things camera, now a stark lesson in Darwinism in technology. You adapt and evolve, or you die. It was revealed today that Kodak is shedding more than £45 million a month. Let’s hold hands.
Kodak insists there is no impending bankrupcy, and that they have £550 million in cash, but bleeding money at the rate they are, that won’t last them through 2012. Maybe that’s what the Mayans were pointing toward this whole time: the end of an epoch, the death of a king. At the time of this writing, Kodak is valued at 65p.
The sad thing is not just that Kodak was great in the past. They’re still making some fantastic things—like the highly revered image sensor in the Leica S2—they’re just not making any money off of them. Their plan to get back into the black? They hope to win patent lawsuits against Apple and RIM. Yes, because Apple is very easy to sue. Oh, and they still have printers! Just like HP still has printers. Sigh.
Kodak isn’t dead, but the time for resuscitation is rapidly running out. The laws of evolution have caught up to them. Unless they come up with something new and wonderful that everybody wants, they will be a memory. I’m not going to wax nostalgic about Kodak’s long history—Michael Hiltzik’s L.A. Times article did a better job of that than I could have—but I will say this: we see companies go the way of the dodo all the time, and usually they’re met with a shrug. Kodak is different. They are a well-entrenched part history. When it goes we’ll feel just that much further away from the Norman Rockwell paintings of yesterday. [L.A. Times]
This week we’re celebrating all things analogue on Gizmodo UK. Check out all our features here, along with exciting competitions!
Well this puts a bit of a downer on film week.
I’m going to shoot an extra roll of Kodak film this week, to cheer myself up
Kodak should have sent their execs for some six sigma training at the advent of digital. Market adaptability fail.
You would have thought they would have seen something ‘developing’
Oh Darrell…!
What?
The top brass lacked the ‘exposure’.
The best way to deal with such hopeless managers is to ‘point & shoot’
Such an approach could be considered ‘negative’.
But they clearly lack ‘Focus’.
Something needs to be done or they’ll be pulling down their ‘shutters’
Maybe management is not the problem, maybe it’s the staff ‘Nikon’ all their stock, they ‘Cannon’ make any money if that happens.
They clearly forgot to put their contact lens on
Oh my, Darrell! The paronomasia has its limits. A Panda dies every time you do that
You ‘shutter’ put a ‘f-stop’ to it a while back.
I think we should all give up. Nothing can surpass Darrell’s last effort.
I ‘Lecia’ thinking there Kat
With that statement. You just murdered Scotlands’ most prized assets, Tian Tian and Yang Guang. I hope youre proud of yourself.
So they’ll be serving deep-fried Panda all over the Gorbals tonight then.
I ‘yield’
Sad to hear
What Kodak should do is change the expiry date on their remaining film stock and sell it to the Lomography users out there for more money.
To celebrate Kodak’s past glories, here’s a nice pic of some 6.5 x 9cm photographic paper I have kicking around. Not sure how old it is; I’m guessing 40 years old? http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7141/6465098341_5be8484548.jpg