[pure-silver] Re: Ilford buys Kentmere
- From: "Richard Knoppow" <dickburk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- To: <pure-silver@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
- Date: Fri, 11 Jan 2008 15:51:41 -0800
----- Original Message -----
From: "Ole Tjugen" <ole@xxxxxxxxxxxx>
To: <pure-silver@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Sent: Friday, January 11, 2008 2:59 PM
Subject: [pure-silver] Re: Ilford buys Kentmere
From what has been disclosed on apug.org, Kentmere will
survive as an independent name as will all their
products. With this purchase, Harman Technologies
(Ilford) have purchased an intermediate coating line
lending itself to smaller runs of special products, while
kentmere on their side have merged with a major player in
the B&W photography field - complete with an
International Marketing Division.
"All Kentmere products" should be read as "everything
Kentmere was producing at the time of aquisition"; so
discontinued products will remain discontinued. So will
the "third party products", which as far as I know
included a repackaged ilford FP4+...
So all in all it's not salvation, but it might be
survival. Since Ilford/Harman will also be producing
Bergger papers, it seems to me that they are aquiring the
"small players" in the field in order to make a larger
unity which can better negotiate with suppliers. After
all - a few years ago Ilford was a small player, ordering
10 kg of some chemical on the coattails of AGFa's 10
tonnes order. Now they are the largest buyer of that
chemical in Europe, and have to hold enough sensitizer dye
for the next 40 years in stock! Consolidating makes
sense. You may not like it, and I certainly don't like
it; but in the current situation there is no other
option.
--
Ole Tjugen
Ilford also posseses advanced, modern technology which
it evidently will make available to Kentmere and other lines
it will now produce.
Probably Kodak had the most advanced technology but
Kodak decided not to continue in the B&W paper business and,
I suspect, will discontinue film when the motion picture
industry stops using it. Agfa just quit so, the only other
company with any know-how is Fuji who doesn't seem
interested in making its B&W paper products available
outside of Japan.
I use quite a bit of Kentmere paper. Its good stuff but
may become even better under the agis of Ilford.
Nonetheless, its still business and no charity will
happen.
IMO the market for non-digital B&W, and probably color
products has stabilized to a great extent. The market
remains large compared to those for most products but shrunk
substantially from its former enormous size which was needed
to support giant companies like Kodak and Agfa.
The continued use of film in the motion picture industry
is iffy, at least for release printing, which accounts for
the bulk of the film it uses.
---
Richard Knoppow
Los Angeles, CA, USA
dickburk@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
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