We’ve known that Kodak has been in trouble for some time now. At the beginning of the year, the former giant filed for bankruptcy, then a month later the company ended up killing production on cameras to cut costs. It was a sad day for a company that led the digital revolution only to lag behind other makers, but that wasn’t all. In March, Kodak dumped its online photo printing service (with an impressive 75 million users) to Shutterfly for a paltry $24 million. Then, in August, Kodak quit the film business too. Now comes even more bad news: Kodak just posted a $312 million loss in the third quarter of this year.Incredibly, that loss came despite $1 billion in revenue over that same three months. Compared to last year’s third quarter, revenue is down by 19 percent, and despite huge cost cutting measures, losses rose from $222 million. Part of those costs are due to cutting 775 jobs, which adds up to 2,800 total cuts at Eastman Kodak this year. The 132-year old firm has lost $3 billion since 2007.The poor numbers has put even more pressure on Kodak to sell one of its last huge assets. The August announcement that Kodak was leaving film meant selling its personalized imaging (film, photo print kiosks, etc.) and document imaging (scanners) division, which reportedly is expected to produce $1.5 billion in revenue this year, or about a third of Kodak’s total projected revenue. The division was responsible for 28 percent of 2011 revenue, as is basically the most ‘Kodak’ part of the company. The division was actually profitable in the last quarter, making $10 million off $382 million in revenue. But Kodak has yet to find a buyer, and is now trying to get bankruptcy courts to allow it to delay presenting its restructuring plan, which was due October 15, until February.So, is Kodak just waiting to die?Read the rest over at Motherboard.
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