Kodak and Fujifilm Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1500 words

Kodak and Fujifilm - Essay Example The company has been slow in responding to the digital revolution. George Eastman started commercial production of dry plates as early as 1888 in New York (Schaede, 2008). He formed Eastman Company in 1888 and later transformed it to Eastman Kodak in 1892. The first brownie Camera was introduced in 1900 while the first motion picture film was launched in 1929. The first digital camera was introduced in 1975 with the capability of capturing black and white images with a resolution of 10,000 pixels. Eastman Kodak ventured in the video market in 1984 with the Kodavision series 2000 8mm video system. In 2003, Kodak Easyshare printer dock 6000 was launched to produce borderless 4 by 6 inch prints. In 2011, the company began shopping its 1,000 digital-imaging patents and experienced a downgrading of its debt ratings. In January 2012, the company announced plans to realign its business operations in order to cut costs but later in the month it filled bankruptcy protection in order to boost cash position and stay in operations. The profits and sales of Eastman Kodak have been eroding since 1990s due to foreign competition from Fujifilm. Eastman Kodak core business is divided in to three business segments that include digital and filming systems for consumers, professionals and entertainment industry (Schaede, 2008). The second business segment is the commercial imaging group that consists of aerial, graphic, micrographic, inkjet printers, scanners and digital printing equipments that target industrial, banking and insurance markets. The third business segment is health imaging that caters for medical films, processing equipments and chemicals (Schaede, 2008). On the other hand, Fuji Photo Film Ltd was founded in 1934 and is headquartered in Tokyo, Japan. Fuji Film prides itself of continuous technological innovations since the company spends almost 7 percent of its sales towards research and development activities. Fuji Photo Film was established as part of the governm ent plans of establishing a local photographic film industry. Ashigara factory began operations immediately by producing photographic print papers, dry plates and photosensitive materials. The company entered the US market in 1965 and diversified to Europe the following year (Schaede, 2008). In 1983, Fuji acquired 51 percent of the shareholding of Chiyoda medical company in order to boost its medical photography and imaging business segment. In the 1990s, the company made several acquisitions and entered markets such as Hong-Kong, China and German. In 2003, an Enovation Graphic system was established in the US and acquired Arch Chemical, Inc currently known as the Fujifilm Electronics materials Co, Ltd. The company acquired Avecia inkjet limited and Problem solving concepts, Inc in order to boost imaging information systems business segment in the US. The company entered in Dubai in 2010 and also acquired endoscopy products in Turkey to boost its sales promotions. FujiFilm launched light production color system for on-demand printing in 2012. Fujifilm core business is divided in to three business segments that include imaging solutions, information solutions and documents solutions. Imaging solutions segment consists of electronic imaging, color films, color chemicals and papers, labs and photofinishing equipments. Information solutions business segments consist of medical systems, graphic systems, industrial products, optical devices and recording media (Schaede, 2008). The document