More Layoffs and Restructuring in Kodak Bankruptcy

The bankruptcy implosion at Eastman Kodak Co. is going from ugly to uglier. How Antonio Perez has been able to remain CEO is more than just a mystery. Perez is naming the leadership for Kodak’s three businesses, and there is going to be some pain here due to “organizational changes and expanded cost structure reductions.”

Yep, it is Employee Morale Day at Kodak … layoffs are coming, and this might not even be the end of the layoffs if you read into the language of the release. The company has reduced its workforce by approximately 2,700 employees since the start of 2012, and now Kodak expects to reduce its workforce by roughly 1,000 more employees by the end of 2012. Kodak’s annualized savings from these new layoffs is approximately $330 million. Here is why there may be more layoffs: An analysis of further operational and workforce reductions is under way.

Kodak’s strategic focus will be on Commercial, Packaging & Functional Printing Solutions and Enterprise Services business, and the sales processes of its Personalized Imaging and Document Imaging businesses.

Antonio Perez said:

We recognize that we must significantly and expeditiously reduce our current cost structure, which is designed for a much larger, more diversified set of businesses. We are reorganizing our senior management team, an action that will help accelerate the creation of a sustainable cost structure for operating our business for the benefit of our customers and position our Personalized Imaging and Document Imaging businesses for successful sales.

Chief Financial Officer Antoinette P. McCorvey has decided to leave the company and will be replaced by Rebecca A. Roof, a managing director of AlixPartners (its restructuring advisory firm), as chief financial officer on an interim basis.

This is just one more scene in the play that was one of the biggest brand deaths ever seen.

JON C. OGG