Transformation

Date: 2015-10-07; view: 451.

Kodak moments

· Kodak founder George Eastman produced the first camera film in rolls in 1883

· The firm Kodak is set up in 1888 and launches the first consumer camera in 1888 with the slogan: "You press the button, we do the rest"

· In 1900 Kodak introduces a consumer camera for $1 called the Brownie, which goes on to become a best-seller in America

· In 1969 a Kodak camera is used during the first Moon landing

· Kodak claims to have invented the world's first digital camera in 1975. It had a resolution of 0.1 megapixels; the camera was the size of a toaster

The company said it had already arranged a $950m (Ј615m) credit facility from Citigroup to keep it going.

The bankruptcy protection move by Kodak affects its operations and companies in the US, but the company said its non-US subsidiaries were not included in the move and would continue to operate as usual.

Its shares were suspended following the announcement. They last traded at 36 cents per share.

Kodak's shares have been in decline over the past decade. It fell out of the Dow Jones Industrial Average of 30 top US companies in 2004. That year, its shares were around $30 each.

Since becoming chief executive, Mr. Perez has been responsible for steering Kodak away from its traditional market in cameras to focus on home and commercial printers and he reiterated the hope that its "breakthrough" printing technologies would give it a competitive advantage as it tries to get back on track.

The firm said earlier this year that it was pinning its hopes on its printer, software and packaging businesses, with the aim of expanding them to account for 25% of its income by 2013. But some analysts remain to be convinced.

"Even though film and developing is a dead business, there is still money to be made in ink and other supplies," technology commentator Larry Magib told BBC World.

"But Hewlett Packard, Canon and Epson have those markets. Kodak does have printers, but it has not been able to succeed in making money from them," he said.

The move to seek bankruptcy protection comes after Kodak failed to sell its catalogue of digital imaging patents last year. At the time, Kodak warned that it would run out of cash if it did not find a buyer by the end of 2011.

It has struggled as mobile phone manufacturers have introduced increasingly sophisticated cameras on their own devices. This has had a huge impact on the lower end of the digital camera market, which Kodak concentrated on.

Kodak is also hoping to make the most of its technology patents involving digital capture, which is used in mobile phones and other portable gadgets. Kodak says these have generated $3bn in revenue since 2003.

Rupert Goodwins, ZD Net UK: "They knew what was happening, but they didn't have the guts to move with it"

On Wednesday, Kodak launched a lawsuit against Samsung, alleging that certain Samsung tablet devices infringe Kodak's digital imaging technology. The South Korean firm said the claims were "unsubstantiated".

It comes a week after Kodak launched a similar lawsuit against HTC and Apple over patents related to digital imaging technology.