BM1807

Names _________________________________________ Section _______________ Date_________

ACTIVITY
Kodak: What Happened to a Great Company?
Yes, Kodak is still a company, having emerged from a 2013 bankruptcy that was preceded by a decade of
selling off intellectual property; failed investments in cameras, printers, and medical devices; and sharp
reductions in their workforce. Of the more than 200 buildings that once stood on the 1,300-acre campus
in Rochester, New York, more than 80 have been demolished, and 59 others have been sold off to other
companies. Eastman Kodak was founded officially in 1881 as the Eastman Dry Plate Company. In 1888,
the name “Kodak” was born and the KODAK camera appeared on the market, with the slogan, “You press
the button—we do the rest.”
The company grew rapidly on the back of research and patents that set the standards for decades. By
1990, it had sales of $19 billion or almost P1 trillion and employed more than 145,000 employees
worldwide. Kodak created digital photography and put the technology into professional cameras in the
early 1990s. While they were the founders of what would eventually mean the demise of the company,
they did little with it, only dabbling in cameras for consumers. It wasn’t that the company didn’t see the
decline in film coming; it was just so profitable to keep producing film that everyone assumed the
company had time to change.
The end began to become very clear. Film sales began plummeting by 20%–30% a year starting in 2001.
The company poured a fortune into a very unsuccessful attempt to enter the digital printing market. Like
so many companies that are unable to adapt to new market conditions, the company suffered through
many rounds of layoffs, restructurings, and asset sales as management teams floundered. In 2013, the
company sold off a majority of its remaining valuable patents to a group of companies including Apple,
Samsung, and Facebook for just over $500 million or P25 billion.
Today the company is owned by a group of private equity investors and is trying to manage the remaining
intellectual property and employees to find some areas of growth. The company excels at high-speed
printing and digital imaging. Some Hollywood directors still use film which Kodak continues to produce,
but the future of the company is murky at best due to rapidly decreasing sales revenue and conflicting
corporate culture. Kodak, once a brand name that rivaled the greatest in the world, may go the way of
other legacy companies that failed to change with the environment.
Answer the following items: (3 items x 10 points)
1. Give the variable/s of environmental scanning which is/are present in the given case study.
2. Explain the most appropriate industry analysis tool which could have been employed by Kodak to
avoid the said organizational problem.
3. Perform an industry analysis for Kodak based on the present context, using your recommended
method or tool in item #2.
Rubric for grading:
CRITERIA PERFORMANCE INDICATORS POINTS
Content Provided pieces of evidence, supporting details, and
8
factual scenarios
Grammar Used correct grammar, punctuation, spelling, and
1
capitalization
Organization of Expressed the points in clear and logical arrangement of
1
ideas ideas in the paragraph
TOTAL 10

Reference:
Bamford, C., Hoffman, A., Hunger, D., & Wheelen, T. (2018). Strategic management and business policy: Globalization, innovation and
sustainability (15th ed.). United Kingdom: Pearson Education Limited.

05 Activity 1 *Property of STI

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