Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2003/09/25
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Kodak is going to make money with ink jet printers, hahahahahahahahahahahahaha. And pray tell just what fabulous expertise do they bring to this table? It must be all the loyal dealers that are begging to be allowed to sell the great yellow fathers products, oh wait, Kodak dumped all the small guys years ago. Well, it must be the big boxes that want a large partner, uh, Wal-Mart is real green right now and the largest retailer of photography is also real green. The reality is that Kodak has been trying to get on the digital wagon since it began. For more than fifteen years they have been sucking the profits out of the film/processing business to build a strong digital presence. During this time while they have been milking the film cow, others have been working to improve their film business and have made huge inroads in the film business, out of Kodak's market share. At the same time, others have moved in to make processing equipment that can do film or digital with almost equal ease. Another poster had it exactly right. Upper management at Kodak has been clueless for years. They lag in the paper and chemistry business, they lag in film technology, their digital offerings may be in sixth or seventh place behind Olympus, Canon, Nikon, Sony, Fuji, and possibly Panasonic, and their professional markets in X-ray etc. are heavily endangered by new technology. The one sort of bright spot is that the movie industry is still very heavily film based but the digital clouds are definitely moving over the horizon. This announcement is just Kodak's way of avoiding lawsuits as their stock drops like a rock. They no longer lead the market, their products margins are disappearing, market share is shrinking, and cash is no longer on hand so the dividend just went away. Gosh, this sounds just like Pan Am, or Studebaker, or Wang. Kodak's woes do not stand in for film. It is just a sad tale of a once proud company whose management could not see the world and adapt to changing conditions. Film will continue to be available for the foreseeable future: six billion rolls of film in 2006 is still a whole lot of profit to seek. Don dorysrus@mindspring.com Disclaimer: After the 96 Olympics when I worked with Kodak and saw first hand how the very top most management was clueless, impotent to act, and utterly without the ability to change course came to the conclusion that this company was the walking dead. USA TEXAS CORPUS CHRISTI 25 September 2003 Hi there-- Apologies in advance if this already has been posted. The Associated Press broadcast wire is reporting that today, the Wall Street Journal will announce that Kodak is preparing to move away from traditional film and into digital technology. It says Kodak hopes to compete head on with Hewlett-Packard, Canon and Epson by launching a line of ink-jet printers. Kodak also says it will make no more significant long-term investments in traditional consumer film. --Bill Clough __________________________________ Do you Yahoo!? The New Yahoo! Shopping - with improved product search http://shopping.yahoo.com - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html - -- To unsubscribe, see http://mejac.palo-alto.ca.us/leica-users/unsub.html