Ilford and the death of film

The British company Ilford is
almost as old as
photography itself.

Founded in 1879, the
company started to
manufacture
photographic plates.

Over the years, Ilford
became a well established
player in the film industry.

In 2004, the year when the
company celebrated its
125th birthday – Ilford filed
for insolvency.

What an odd coincidence.

The rise of digital
photography had put the
company in deep trouble
over the last years.

Demand for film had decreased rapidly and
most of Ilford’s business therefore reached
a dead end.

Let’s take a look at what
happened to Ilford.

In the 20th century, the
company emerged as one of
the dominant film
manufacturers with a
particularly strong position in
black and white photography.

A square
image in
black and
white – this
photo is
most likely
taken with
a
Hasselblad,
using Ilford
film.

Henri Cartier-Bresson,
perhaps the greatest photo
journalist in history, used
Leica in combination with
Ilford film.

This image of the Vietnam war was
captured by Ilford and Leica.

Photos
of
Marilyn
Monroe

Cartier-Bresson was one of
the great ambassadors for
black and white film.
Coincidentially he passed
away in 2004 when Ilford was
in deep trouble.

Ilford also launched some
cameras and colour film
from the 1940s and on.

But the company flagship was
always the niche product
black and white film.

Since film was a consumable
good, there was always demand
for it back in the analogue era.

Though the firm met some
competition with the rise of the
Japanese companies in 1950-1970, it
still remained healthy and profitable.

With the rise of digital imaging in
the 1990s, the photo community
started to discuss whether and to
what extent film would be replaced
by digital cameras.

\"I use both, but I can put my
heart into film. I don't think we'll
ever see it totally disappear.“
// Hideki Fujii, director of the
Nippon Photography Institute, a
Tokyo-based photo school

\"The fact is, people prefer film.“
\"The look and feel of it puts it
on a different level to digital
output.“
// Steven Brierley, sales director
at Ilford Photo of Britain, 2006

Though it was far from obvious that
film would die, Ilford still decided to
stop putting R&D into it.

In the mid 1990s, the Swiss branch
of Ilford in Marly started to explore
the area of inkjet paper and
nanotechnology.

The Swiss branch had been in
the colour segment of film and
had always been more
technologically advanced.

Maybe such investments could help
Ilford to survive in the digital area?

Doing so was a bit risky, since no
one really knew whether this would
create any revenues at all.

For about five years, these
investments did not contribute at all
to the business of Ilford.

The Swiss group started
off by focusing on
colour film but
continuously moved
away from this and
towards papers for
digital prints.

In this period, they went
from basic research into
full production of inkjet
paper which enabled film
quality. It turned out to be a
huge and growing market.

At the same time, the core
film business started to
decline rapidly.

The explosion
30
25
20
15
10
5
0
1994 1995 1996 1997 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005
Number of film and digital cameras sold in the
United States (guess which one is digital!)

In 2000-2004,
the film
business
decreased at
about 10-20
percent
annually.

Given that
there are a lot
of fixed costs
related to
production,
this implied
huge losses
for Ilford.

While the Swiss branch kept growing, the old,
traditional Ilford faced extinction and
several layoffs took place in these years.

Profits kept rising in the
digital inkjet printing while
the old business collapsed.

In the first seven months of
2004, film sales declined with
a mortal 26 percent. Up to
this point, more than 50
percent of the UK employees
had been fired and the
company had accumulated a
debt of £40 million.

In mid 2004 the company
became insolvent and was
restructured through a
management buy-out.

The new ‘old’ Ilford kept producing
black and white film and even re-
introduced some old products.

The company is now owned by what
is called Harman Technologies Ltd
(Harman was the founder of Ilford)
and is traded under Ilford Photo.

They’ve found a niche where film
can survive on a small scale.

The expanding Swiss branch was sold
to Oji, a Japanese paper company and
has kept growing ever since.

They still use the llford brand and sell
some colour film as well.

“Oji’s corporate strategy is to build
global networks for existing products
and to develop new product capabilities
to meet the demands of the changing
marketplace. The acquisition of ILFORD
in July 2005, meets this overall strategy.”
// From the webpage

Summing up: the old Ilford survived in a
different shape after a lot of downsizing
and a few ownership changes. The
Swiss business prospers today after
having developed inkjet printing paper.

A lot of
shareholder value
must have been
created from the
strategy to go for
inkjet paper and
nanotechnology
back in the mid
1990s.

The manager in charge of the Swiss and
British sites had to decide whether to
spread resources thinly or put them all
in one uncertain basket.

He was brave enough to go for
one basket, and this turned out to
be crucial for the company.

In a fast-moving industry which is
heading for a digital revolution,
hedging and playing low-risk
does not seem to be an option.

Sources
The British Journal of Photography
Credit Suisse
Ilford Chronology

Image attributions

Christian Sandström is a
PhD student at Chalmers
University of Technology in
Gothenburg, Sweden. He
writes and speaks about
disruptive innovation and
technological change.
www.christiansandstrom.org
christian.sandstrom@chalmers.se