After the recent PRINTING United event in Dallas, it is now evident that the importance and timeliness of business transformation is not just for service providers—it is also for hardware and software manufacturers. In my recent interview with Gavin Jordan-Smith of Ricoh, you can hear and almost feel the direction that many equipment suppliers are beginning to take to prepare themselves and their customers for the future. The most important thing to realize is that as technologies and markets change, the speed at which a company addresses transformation can position them as a leader or laggard going forward. Examples of this can be seen in these two formerly leading companies, both with roots in Rochester N.Y., grappling with their transformations while their customers are having to do the same.

Kodak was once synonymous with Imaging. In fact, it once was a “Kodak moment.” As things began to change, they were slow to recognize and transform. In 1997, Kodak had a market cap of almost $30B; today it is about $118M, a significant reduction. Their transformation truly started around 2005 but was in full force in 2012 when they filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection. Ultimately, with the delay, this became a very hard transformation which included many cuts and even the selling off of their flexo group, now known as Miraclon. Today, Kodak is beginning to show signs of stability and new life. This good news is a result of the receipts from this sale, the resultant debt payoff, and the appointment of Jim Continenza as Executive Chairman and CEO to lead the transformational rebirth going forward.

A few early indications of this shift are starting to surface. First, Kodak is starting to view their print divisions, both Inkjet (EISD) and their Nexpress group, as a more unified offering instead of competing as independent groups. (See my interview with Patti Smith.) Additionally, Prinergy, their flagship workflow software which was getting long in the tooth, is apparently being updated along with a move to the Microsoft Azure cloud as their new Prinergy VME (Virtual Machine Environment). Each of these steps on its own is fairly significant, but viewed as part of the whole is an indication that a positive transformation with an eye on growth is on its way, and I am sure there are more exciting things coming.