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Kodak and the digital camera it buried

Business & startups

Kodak and the digital camera it buried

11 min

Kodak invented the digital camera in 1975 and shelved it to protect its film empire. Explore how a dominant company killed its own future rather than cannibalize its present, and the slow-motion collapse that followed.

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Show notes

The first digital camera prototype weighed eight pounds and required twenty-three seconds to record a single image.

Kodak executives suppressed digital technology to protect high-profit margins on chemical film and silver halide salts.

Steve Sasson used Moore’s Law to correctly predict when digital sensors would reach parity with traditional film.

The nineteen ninety-two Photo CD failed because it was a complex hybrid compromise rather than a digital leap.

Kodak lost sixty dollars on every digital camera sold despite reaching the top of the sales market.

Apple and Google purchased Kodak's digital patent portfolio for five hundred twenty-seven million dollars after its bankruptcy.

In this episode

  1. 1Intro1 min
  2. 2The Toaster with a Lens2 min
  3. 3The Razor and Blade Trap2 min
  4. 4The Illusion of Resilience3 min
  5. 5The Slow-Motion Collapse2 min
  6. 6Outro1 min

Sources

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Kodak and the digital camera it buried — Fylom