Kodak cautions on business operations but remains confident it can meet debt obligations

Key Points

• Kodak is warning of "substantial doubt" about its future viability due to challenges in meeting upcoming debt obligations.
• The company's shares dropped over 13% in early trading following the announcement.
• Kodak has only $155 million in cash and cash equivalents, with concerns about its ability to pay pension obligations and upcoming debts.
• The company is nearing completion of a manufacturing plant for regulated pharmaceuticals, marking a pivot from its traditional photography business.

The more than 130-year-old Eastman Kodak Co. is cautioning on its business operations, but says it is confident it will be able to work out upcoming debt obligations.

“Kodak has debt coming due within 12 months and does not have committed financing or available liquidity to meet such debt obligations if they were to become due in accordance with their current terms,” the company wrote in a regulatory filing. “These conditions raise substantial doubt about Kodak's ability to continue as a going concern.”

The Rochester, New York-based company said that it had $155 million of cash and cash equivalents as of June 30, with $70 million held within the U.S.

Kodak said in a statement on Tuesday that the going concern language in its regulatory filing is essentially a required disclosure because its debt comes due within 12 months of the filing.

“Kodak is confident it will be able to pay off a significant portion of its term loan well before it becomes due, and amend, extend or refinance our remaining debt and/or preferred stock obligations,” the company said.

Last year Kodak said that it would end its retirement income plan in order to pay down debt, according to The Wall Street Journal. Kodak Chief Financial Officer David Bullwinkle said in a statement on Monday that the company expects to know by Friday how it will satisfy its obligations to pay all pension plan participants and foresees completing the reversion by December.

Founded by George Eastman in 1880, Eastman Kodak Co. is credited with popularizing photography at the start of the 20th century and was known all over the world for its Brownie and Instamatic cameras and its yellow-and-red film boxes. It was first brought down by Japanese competition and then an inability to keep pace with the shift from film to digital technology.

Kodak filed for bankruptcy protection in 2012 after struggling with increasing competition, continuing growth in digital photography and growing debt. The company wound up selling off many of its businesses and patents, while shutting down the camera manufacturing unit that first made it famous. It received approval for its plan to emerge from court oversight a year later. At the time, Kodak was looking to recreate itself as a new, much smaller company focused on commercial and packaging printing.

Kodak is now nearing completion on a manufacturing plant to create regulated pharmaceutical products. The company already makes unregulated key starting materials for pharmaceuticals. Production at the retrofitted facility is expected to start later this year.

Shares slid more than 25% in midday trading.