Kodak to sell two imaging businesses to its UK pension for $650 mln

[Evanjoe610]

Heads Up Folks. It appears that Kodak will sell the two imaging business that contains the commerical imaging group.
Lets hope that it will help revive the Scanners again.

http://news.yahoo.com/kodak-sell-two...132251382.html


Kodak to sell two imaging businesses to its UK pension for $650 mln

(Reuters) - Bankrupt photography pioneer Eastman Kodak Co said it will sell two of its remaining imaging businesses to its UK pension fund for $650 million.

The agreement, subject to approval by the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan, also settles the fund's claims of about $2.8 billion against Kodak.

The settlement assures Kodak's continued operations outside the United States, Chief Executive Antonio Perez said in a statement.

Kodak has been trying to sell most of its consumer and document imaging businesses and shift its focus to commercial imaging.

The two businesses being sold are personalized imaging, which includes most consumer products and retail printing kiosks, and its document imaging unit that makes scanners for enterprise customers.

Kodak's commercial imaging business includes its graphic communication, film and specialty chemical products.

Kodak last month amended its financing deal that required it to raise at least $600 million from the sale of noncommercial imaging assets.

The company, which launched its first camera in 1888, was unable to successfully shift to digital imaging and filed for bankruptcy protection last year.

Its bankruptcy case is in Re: Eastman Kodak Co. et al, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of New York, No. 12-10202.

(Reporting by Tanya Agrawal in Bangalore; Editing by Joyjeet Das)

[Sal Santamaura]

The UK Pension Plan, which will choose a name for its new entity at time of closing, will merely distribute Kodak-branded film manufactured and supplied by Eastman Kodak Company in Rochester, which will retain ownership and operation of the coating facility/equipment there. While this sale will include a coating facility in England that makes color paper, any future decision by the new entity to coat film itself should be viewed as a start-up operation.

One cannot simply move production of existing films to a new coating line and expect them to be the same. When Kodak transitioned production of its films to the large Bldg. 38 equipment approximately a decade ago, product characteristics changed substantially.

The key question to ask about this deal is "Will the agreement include terms which guarantee the new Personalized Imaging & Document Imaging owning entity that Kodak will continue to supply existing film products for a minimum number of years? If so, how many years?

Update: Kodak's PR person responded to me this way:

http://www.apug.org/forums/viewpost.php?p=1492100

I guess we'll just have to wait and see how long "long term" is.