The end of Kodak moments?

Sarah McCammon Sep 3, 2013
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The end of Kodak moments?

Sarah McCammon Sep 3, 2013
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This is what you might call a Kodak moment – or at least a big moment for Kodak. The company is emerging from bankruptcy – with a very different focus.

When most people think of Kodak, they think of cameras and film.

“I have a little camera; it’s a Kodak,” says 81-year-old Donna Crawford of Des Moines, Iowa. “And I’ve had it ever since I was a little girl.”

But cameras are Kodak’s past. The future, analysts say, is commercial printing.

George Conboy is chairman of Brighton Securities in Rochester, New York. He says Kodak will survive not by putting pictures on film, but by printing images on all sorts of products and packages.

“Think about a bottle of juice or a yogurt cup or something,” he says.

The days of Kodak as a giant, international company are over, says industry consultant Dave Zwang of Zwang & Co.

“They’re gonna have to be like pretty much every company now,” he says. “Nimble, agile, and be willing to turn on a dime and support the new requirements and demands of the market.”

Zwang says Kodak is re-emerging as a smaller, leaner company – one that will have to fight for its share of a crowded industry.

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