Kodak Patented the Digital Camera. It Expired in 1997. #Shorts

About this episode

Kodak invented the digital camera in 1975 and patented it in 1978. It still went bankrupt. The twist: the patent expired in 1997, two years before camera makers even started counting digital shipments. Kodak's later patents brought in over $3 billion in licensing after 2003, and in 2010 licensing brought in $838 million while Kodak still lost $687 million. In 2012 it filed for Chapter 11 and sold its digital imaging patents for about $525 million. The full story is on the channel. Patents shown: US 4,131,919 ("Electronic Still Camera", Lloyd and Sasson, filed May 20, 1977, granted Dec. 26, 1978, expired May 20, 1997) Credits Drawing of the 1975 Kodak prototype: Bertrand Labévue, CC BY-SA 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/), via Wikimedia Commons: https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Kodak_Sasson_BL.jpg Patent drawings: USPTO. Charts: Invent Anything, from CIPA data and Kodak SEC filings. Music and sound design: original. Not affiliated with Eastman Kodak Company. Kodak is a trademark of Eastman Kodak Company. Strategy education, not legal advice. ipCapital Group. #Kodak #Patents #Innovation #DigitalCamera #Strategy