Eastman Kodak Essay

The largest contributor to the problems plaguing the Eastman Kodak Company is its failure to predict, innovate, and establish market share in the imaging industry’s change to the digital sector. The success experienced by Kodak in the last 100 years was a direct result of their ability to adopt disruptive technology with regards to film sales and development to stay one step ahead of its competitors. Their refusal to do the same at the start of the digital age slashed any chance of major success down the road for the company.
Table A1. SWOT Analysis.
Strengths Weaknesses
• Over a century of experience an innovation of the traditional film based imaging industry
• Well known household name for over a century
• Large international presence

To achieve this, Kodak had to adopt on more than one occasion disruptive technology as technology improved in making the film and film based cameras. The massive success and growth in this era of Kodak’s history brought many things to the table that are still relevant and can be applied by management moving forward. However small it becomes, there will always be a demand for traditional photography products and services where Kodak is the “go to guy” for. But this century of success brought about valuable international presence, made Kodak one of the most known industry names, gave Kodak priceless and efficient distribution channels, and massive financial resources which can all be applied moving

Often the work conducted in Kodak’s research labs related to digital technology was left unappreciated by other by the rest of the company who still believed in silver halide film as the industry standard. Kodak also faltered in its ability to put its acquisitions to use. In addition to some questionable acquisitions, Kodak’s shear inability to convert the acquired technical expertise to successful knew products proved many of its acquisitions to be a waste of time and resources. As an example, Sterling Drug was acquired in 1988 by Kodak for $5.1 billion. The company was purchased solely because the Kodak managerial team felt that the pharmaceutical industry was at its core a chemical business like itself. [article] “Kodak soon learned that chemically treated photo paper isn’t really all that similar to hormonal agents and cardiovascular drugs,” [forbes] and in turn sold the company in pieces for just about half the amount Kodak acquired it for.