One of the biggest brands in the graphic arts, Kodak appears caught in a life-and-death race to monetise the technology chief executive Antonio Perez has effectively bet the company’s future on (writes Peter Coleman).

The first fruits of the company’s investment in Stream technology are already in the marketplace, but volume sales from its groundbreaking inkjet printing will doubtless wait on the massive DRUPA trade fair in May.

Tens of thousands of equipment buyers descend on Düsseldorf, Germany, then to find the products which will provide them with a technology edge for the next four years.

Kodak believes it has the answers in low-cost – arguably as cheap as offset – inkjet print production and expects to bring more product to market then. But so will HP, Océ, Screen and others among the dozen-or-so digital print systems vendors vying for market success.

Many do not carry the ‘baggage’ that has hampered Eastman Kodak’s transition from analogue to digital business – among them reportedly, hefty obligations to staff who received generous pensions in the company’s heyday – but neither do they have the same advantages.

Over the years, Kodak has bought and sold companies and their technology, sometimes more than once. In the newspaper sector, some of the more prominent technology has come from Creo (CTP) and Scitex (prepress and digital printing), and systems vendor Atex is among companies which have been owned and sold by Kodak over the years.

Now the intellectual property storecupboard is being raided to get the business out of its current dilemma. Some former Kodak patents are already being used in applications such as consumer electronics. And there are others which the company would obviously prefer not to part with.

It clearly faces trying times: The ‘Wall Street Journal’ reported last week that Eastman Kodak was preparing a Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection filing in case it is unable to raise enough capital through patent sales. The US procedure provides companies with a degree of protection from creditors, and Kodak wouldn’t be the first in the graphic arts industry to make use of it.

The company has already denied (in September) that it was preparing for bankruptcy, but has not so far commented on the latest reports which say that it is looking for US$1 billion debtor-in-possession finance.

As in the case of German press maker manroland, which filed for insolvency under local laws at the end of last year, time is of the essence. Both need breathing space to resolve problems and reach the immediate ‘finishing post’ that DRUPA offers.

• Two things have happened since we first posted this piece. Firstly Kodak has announced it has appointed its general consel, Laura Quatela as president alongside Philip Faraci. And secondly, it has put Quatel and Faraci (respectively) in charge of new consumer and business segments.

There's a sniff 'moving the deckchairs' about this, but efficiently executed, it could provide Kodak with the means to make further changes it needs, and if necessary, split up the business for sale, or even exit parts of it.