OceanProd/Depositphotos.com
August 15, 2025
Is Kodak’s Demise on the Horizon?
Kodak may not be the household name in 2025 that it was in decades past — the famous “Kodak moment” pop culture cliche springs immediately to mind — but it has certainly driven renewed news interest in recent days, initially spurred by a report that it was unable to secure “committed financing or available liquidity” to pay ~$500 million in upcoming debt obligations, as CNN Business indicated.
“These conditions raise substantial doubt about the company’s ability to continue as a going concern,” Kodak stated in a filing related to the matter.
However, in more recent news, Kodak itself downplayed the severity of its previous commentary. In an Aug. 13 blog post, Kodak reiterated that it “has no plans to cease operations, go out of business, or file for bankruptcy protection,” and that, to the contrary, “Kodak is confident it will repay, extend, or refinance its debt and preferred stock on, or before, its due date.”
In follow-up bullet points, Kodak said it would have a stronger balance sheet than it had enjoyed in years following the planned transactions, and would be virtually debt-free at that time, and that the “going concern disclosure” it had put forth was a technical report required by accounting rules.
“Media reports that Kodak is ceasing operations, going out of business, or filing for bankruptcy are inaccurate and reflect a fundamental misunderstanding of a recent technical disclosure the Company made to the SEC in its recently filed second quarter earnings report. These articles are misleading and missing critical context, and we’d like to set the record straight,” Kodak laid out in the lede of its blog post.
Kodak Selling US Pension Fund, Expects $300 Million in Cash and $200 Million in Investment Assets
Kodak indicated that it was expecting a total sum of $500 million — $300 million in cash and $200 million in investment assets, which are to be converted to cash — following the close of the sale of its U.S. pension fund.
Notably, as the company pointed out, this would be the projected net result after Kodak met all obligations to existing pension fund participants.
Kodak Seeing a Slowdown in Business in 2025
However, as Forbes contributor Mark Faithfull underscored, business hasn’t been particularly sunny for Kodak in recent days.
In the quarter ending June 30, Kodak saw a sales decline of 1%, to $263 million, and gross profit margins tumbled from 22% to 19%. Net loss was registered on a quarterly basis, coming in at $26 million, as compared with a net profit of $26 million a year prior. The change in fortunes was attributed, at least in part, to higher aluminum costs, as well as increased manufacturing expenses.
“Kodak at its peak employed more than 140,000 workers but now has a workforce of about 3,400 and is still struggling to recover from its failure to adapt to digital photography and the decline of film. Despite emerging from bankruptcy protection in 2013 and turning to commercial print, advanced materials and chemicals, the company’s once dominant position in consumer photography seems a world away,” Faithfull wrote.
“Some Kodak protagonists have likened the company’s struggles to those of Apple, which lost its way against rivals such as Microsoft before reinventing itself as a cool, multi-smart device brand. However, Apple’s slump occurred while the computer industry was still relatively imature [sic], whereas Kodak missed the boat when digital challengers and new technology emerged,” he added.
On the other hand, Faithfull noted that Kodak retains strong legacy brand recognition, particularly in the Gulf region — and a small comeback of the retro camera trend has driven at least some interest stateside, particularly among members of Gen Z. Attributing zoomers with an affinity for digital minimalism, alongside a desire to use film cameras and develop film, the Forbes contributor saw at least a spark of hope for a Kodak turnaround within this demographic.
After making ill-timed bets on the coming dominance of digital photography — which was instead met by the proliferation of the smartphone — could Kodak avoid a market exit, instead leveraging its longstanding history to re-ignite consumer interest?
Discussion Questions
Will Kodak be forced to cease operations or declare bankruptcy by 2030? Why or why not?
How could Kodak potentially leverage its established brand image to mount a turnaround effort in its segment?
Is the interest exhibited in Kodak’s retro product lineup by Gen Z substantial enough to produce significant revenue, or is this more of a mirage?
Poll
Loading …BrainTrust
Jamie Tenser
Retail Tech Marketing Strategist | B2B Expert Storytelling™ Guru | President, VSN Media LLC
Kai Clarke
CEO, President- American Retail Consultants
Mohamed Amer, PhD
CEO & Strategic Board Advisor, Strategy Doctor
Recent Discussions
More Discussions
Has Kroger Discovered the Limits of Automated Warehouses?
Kroger is winding down its relationship with Ocado, citing cost overruns and a reorganization of its…What Can Ross Do To Cement its Recent Success Story?
Ross has seen strong sales and projects this trend to continue. How can it best cement…Is Cyber Week Set To Smash Sales Records This Year, as Salesforce Suggests?
Salesforce suggests that Cyber Week will set records in terms of sales this year. Is this…
While the decline of traditional cameras and film was inevitable, Kodak’s downfall stems from its failure to adapt to these shifts. Although there is a small market left for traditional film, mainly stemming from those chasing nostalgia, this is not sufficient to keep Kodak afloat – especially not with the debts it has to service. As such, the company should have long since heavily diversified into other adjacent and related area such as medical imaging, materials science, and even AI image creation. Fujifilm did this and it has fared much better than Kodak. Can Kodak survive? If it can overcome its debt issues then yes – but as a much smaller firm.
As I understand it Kodak actually has a successful (part of the) business in licensing, chemicals, etc.; just not photography. So the company will probably survive in a technical sense, altho they might decide to just sell those assets off and be done with it. It’s easy, in retrospect, to trace out the should have‘s, but I’m not sure, they were apparent at the time (and of course not particularly useful now).Very sad, certainly, for anyone…well old enough to be offering up opinions on RW.
Kodak’s patent portfolio was once an enormously valuable asset. In 2007 I was invited by Eastman Kodak to lead a workshop for its engineers to explore potentials to develop new businesses from its IP. The experience was eye-opening.
When it was inventing technologies (including the first digital camera system in 1975) its film and mass-market camera manufacturing businesses were so dominant that promising product strategies were sometimes shelved.
Kodak developed one of the earliest digital projection systems for movie theaters too.
While the economies of scale are much diminished, there remains a niche market for film photography, chemicals and developing services.
Kodak’s future as a consumer brand company may face some headwinds in the smartphone era, but it is no one-trick pony. I’d bet on them to thrive.
That any part of Kodak still exists is a bit of a miracle — despite what exists being merely a shadow which carries the name “Kodak.” What is concerning is that the company has not discovered a potent source of value for which it will be paid. A great deal of what they’ve done is live off various residues from the past without yet discovering an important path to the future. The problem, though, isn’t that Kodak failed to adjust to market changes due to digital. There were no market changes as the entire mass consumer camera and photography market disappeared within 5 years after smartphones arrived. Kodak was well prepared for a digital market — but there ended up not being a digital market. I’ve written more about this here: https://www.douggarnett.com/vertical-markets/consumer-electronics/surviving-disruption-part-2-kodak-died-fujifilm-thrived-why/
Impressive analysis, Doug. Thanks for sharing the link. I’d shade your argument slightly by suggesting that Kodak’s greatest failing was that it ignored, underinvested or postponed numerous market creation opportunities from its IP portfolio. Fujifilm at least had the foresight to diversify its lines of business.
True, neither company could have forecast how smartphones would virtually eliminate the mass market digital camera sector.
I agree with that. What’s interesting, though, is that Kodak R&D spending in the 1980s was astounding ($1B annually) AND heavily focused on diversification. There are a lot of public announcements emphasizing all the things they believed they were creating. I have some theories but the diversity was never as important on their P&L as it has been for Fuji. Further, they made the error of focusing their R&D on clear goals. That might seem an odd critique but the Kenneth Stanley book Why Greatness Cannot Be Planned: The Myth of the Objective has excellent insights into, for example, why we are still running an economy heavily affected by what Bell Labs research revealed while Kodak’s R&D had little effect.
This is a little like hearing that a celebrity has died — and you just assumed they were deceased decades earlier.
Kodak is a dinosaur that is unable to adapt to modern needs and operations so it will probably perish by 2030. It is technology that kodak cannot seem to grasp. There is no more photography, since everything has gone digital, and the requirements of a photo device can now be fulfilled via your phone and not through the lens of a camera. Video recording has shifted the same way, as has computer media. In fact Kodak has no true offering in the media world at all. It has long been outpaced by technology and its competitors, so the only feasible way to continue is probably to perish over the short term.
Kodak’s death has been predicted so many times that it’s become retail’s version of Groundhog Day. But this time feels different. Pundits and analysts have been writing Kodak’s obituary since before its 2012 bankruptcy and after its NFT/crypto moment. The company has survived through financial engineering, asset sales, and periodic nostalgia cycles. But in 2025, the company is finally running out of legacy assets to monetize and is facing a “math problem.”
Fujifilm’s successful pivot to medical imaging and cosmetics was due to its deep R&D capabilities and adjacent technologies. However, Kodak hollowed out those capabilities decades ago. They had the patents but lacked the organizational discipline to commercialize them systematically.
Kodak survives as a licensing entity and niche chemicals business, but the consumer brand is effectively finished. The Gen Z film photography trend is real, but economically irrelevant – like vinyl records, it’s a hobby market, not a business foundation. Once strategic drift and operational failures set in, the organizational and leadership efforts necessary to turn the business around are Herculean. Kodak never had a chance.
I agree with many of the comments questioning the future of Kodak. Unfortunately, its saga as a manufacturer parallels that of Sears. Today, Sears has less than 10 stores, down from its heyday of 3500 stores. At its peak, two out of three Americans shopped there regularly. Why did Sears fail? Due to failed adaptation to changing consumer behavior, increased competition from other retailers, and strategic missteps by leadership. These are the same conditions dooming Kodak. It is not that history repeats itself; it is the failure to learn from history that repeats itself.
RIP Kodak.
Kodak’s recent debt news has raised questions about its future, but the company has made it clear it does not plan to shut down or file for bankruptcy. The real challenge for Kodak is less about headlines and more about whether it can find a steady path forward.
Sales are slipping and costs are rising, but the brand still has recognition, especially with younger people showing interest in film cameras again. If Kodak can build on that interest and manage its finances better, it has a chance to stay relevant. If not, it may continue to fade further from the market.