Word: kodak
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Fisher has had plenty to brag about since his arrival. He shook up Kodak with rigorous pay-for-performance standards and refocused the company by selling off ill-advised acquisitions like drugmaker Sterling Winthrop, thereby cutting Kodak's $8 billion debt burden to a comfortable $1 billion. At the same time, he has greatly accelerated Kodak's once sluggish product-development cycles. "There is no self-doubt as to where the opportunities lie," says company president Daniel Carp, a 27-year Kodak veteran and Fisher's presumed heir. Nor, Carp adds, is there any lack of confidence in Kodak...
...Kodak's bets on the future have so far brought more problems than profits. After investing billions of dollars to create the industry's most extensive line of digital cameras, Kodak could pile up losses of more than $100 million this year, and some analysts doubt that the effort will ever pay off. The devices (price range: $200 to $900) record images on microchips for computer users. But the field is already glutted with dozens of rivals, from traditional camera makers such as Canon and Nikon to Silicon Valley giants like Hewlett-Packard. Fisher counters that naysayers saw few profits...
Nonetheless, Fisher readily admits that Kodak botched the launch last year of its 24-mm Advantix camera (price range: $50 to $250), the company's other major new high-tech consumer product. Kodak figured that shoppers would snap up a camera that loaded film in snafu-proof cassettes and produced high-quality photos that could be captured on film, filed easily and transferred to computers. But the launch, estimated to have cost $100 million, faltered for a lack of sufficient cameras in stores and a shortage of processors equipped with gear to develop the images. Now, for a fresh...
Fisher launched the trade case in part to get Kodak on the offensive and force Fuji to raise prices. He took a similar tack at Motorola, using U.S. government negotiators to open the Japanese market for microchips. Last week House Speaker Newt Gingrich and minority leader Dick Gephardt urged President Clinton to use "all available means" to pry open Japan's market. Fuji denies any wrongdoing, and it is preparing to make the issue moot in the future by adding a 35-mm color-film plant, part of a $200 million investment, to its existing manufacturing complex in Greenwood...
...heart and soul of the picture business," says Fisher, as if to rally the home team. That's certainly true. But even if Kodak wins its case, undoing Fuji's market inroads will be difficult. Indeed, the bitter rivalry with Fuji revives memories of epic U.S.-Japanese clashes over products such as steel, televisions and autos. All Fisher needs to do is look at the auto nameplates in the parking lot to judge the staying power of determined rivals...