Kodak

[ARRIVALS]

I realise it's a few days late, but I've only just read up about the Kodak issue, and came across this interesting article.

In 1998 Kodak was the fourth most-valuable brand in the world, just behind Disney, Coca-Cola and McDonald's. 16 years later, Disney is worth $70 billion, Coca-Cola is worth $154 billion, McDonald's is worth $104 billion and Kodak is bankrupt.

You have to wonder how exactly that happened, when in 1976, Kodak invented the digital camera. In 1986, Kodak announced the development of the world's first megapixel digital sensor small enough for a handheld camera, one that had 1.4 million pixels and in 1994, Kodak introduced the first digital camera under $1,000.

Between 1985 and 1994, Kodak invested some $5 billion into digital research & development.

American marketing expert Al Ries then gave his opinion on why Kodak went bust. "Kodak means "film" photography. Kodak doesn't mean "digital" photography. The Kodak brand was stuck in the past and the only thing that could have saved the company was a second brand. Kodak should have given its digital brand a different name than its film brand."

Recon he's right? If so, what do you think they might have called it?

Here's the article. http://www.thedrum.co.uk/opinion/201...finally-failed

[Dave L]

I'd suggest that the bigger issue for Kodak has been the fact that snaps are now taken on telephones.

[sdesign1]

I'd say that was pretty much on the nail - we had a digital revolution and a brand that was very very firmly embedded in film. The perception, which is what matters, was that Kodak was not an innovative digital company. They had a choice of spending millions on marketing to convince us otherwise or creating a new brand (and also spending millions on marketing it) - neither happened.

[Minuteman Press]

Also Kodak decided not to move into the middle - higher quality digital camera market.

[TheLogoBar]

They could have started developing cameras/lenses for phones, thats a pretty big market today. Not as much profit I imagine, but still better than where they are now.