Kodak Announces Digital Currency and Blockchain Service – Shares Skyrocket
Kodak has been around for roughly 130 years, and during this time, the group has mostly focused on providing an array of services for photographers throughout the world. However, as it struggled with the evolution of technology, during the last few years, Kodak has been on a continuous downfall.
Yet, the blockchain and digital currency revolution may just become Kodak’s saviour. According to recent reports, the company has just partnered up with WENN Digital, and launched its very own cryptocurrency, the KodakCoin. Its main purpose is to help created an encrypted ledger meant to help photographers deal with ownership rights, via blockchain technology.
It is important to point out the fact that during the last couple of months, numerous companies have profited from adding blockchain to their names, or beginning to offer blockchain-related services. Some have seen stock prices double, thus leading to a higher rate of success on the market.
The idea behind Kodak’s newest service is that for years, photographers have been struggling to control their image rights, due to the sheer size of the internet, thus leading to a big drop in terms of revenue associated with stock photography.
Therefore, Kodak will use blockchain technology to help create and keep stronger links between photographers and their images. The purpose of the KodakCoin, is to pay photographers directly once an image that they have taken is used, or purchased on the internet.
According to Jeff Clarke, the CEO of Kodak: “For many in the tech industry, ‘blockchain’ and ‘cryptocurrency’ are hot buzzwords, but for photographers who’ve long struggled to assert control over their work and how it’s used, these buzzwords are the keys to solving what felt like an unsolvable problem.”
Following the announcement, the share prices for the firm have increased from $3 per share, at the beginning of the trading day, to a close of $6.8, thus showcasing an increase of approximately 119% in terms of their share prices.
Based on everything that has been outlined so far, it will be interesting to see whether Kodak’s new business model will turn out to be successful, or whether it will be a simple capitalization on the current digital currency and blockchain trends.