Fujifilm Expanding into Pharmaceuticals

Neanderman · Feb 15, 2008

Re the broad application of coating technology, it was for this reason that I thought Kodak's going into the video tape business made sense (this assumes, of course, that they were making their own tape...). Unfortunately, I suspect it was hard for them to compete with 3M and some of the other tape manufacturers that also made other magnetic tape products, probably in much larger quantities.

Ed

Photo Engineer · Feb 15, 2008

Neanderman said:
Re the broad application of coating technology, it was for this reason that I thought Kodak's going into the video tape business made sense (this assumes, of course, that they were making their own tape...). Unfortunately, I suspect it was hard for them to compete with 3M and some of the other tape manufacturers that also made other magnetic tape products, probably in much larger quantities.

Ed

Ed;

Kodak did indeed do all their own R&D and coat the tape. Unfortunately, it was not economical in the face of 3M just as 3M films were not competitive to Kodak products.

PE

pauliej · Feb 16, 2008

Yes, companies continue to learn VERY EXPENSIVE lessons, at the shareholder's expense. This worked a lot better before Wally-mart forced the manufacturers to reduce (or eliminate) their profits for increased sales. Not sure if this was a wise business decision for long term survival. And so it goes...

Paul

jpeets · Feb 18, 2008

I have worked in the pharmaceutical industry for just under 20 years. This news is quite disturbing to me, for a number of reasons, many enumerated above.

As previously noted, there is no significant relationship/synergy between producing films and pharmaceuticals. The latter business is very highly regulated, and operates at far higher levels of QA/QC. It is also an industry that is quite risky.

The only one compound in 10,000 makes it to the marketplace, and the average cost of developing a successful drug these days is not far off a billion dollars (US). It takes up to 10 years of testing and regulatory review to get the drug approved.

The industry has picked off the low-hanging fruit, and is finding it harder and harder to develop drugs that are real breakthroughs. Smaller companies simply don't have the resources to do R&D: the big guys are using very expensive and very high tech approaches to synthesize and screen compounds at astounding rates (up to hundreds per day, if I recall correctly). The acquired company seems to have a very sparse pipeline.

I am concerned that by straying too far from its core competence, Fujifilm may be sinking money into a venture with poor or negative returns. I want Fujifilm and Kodak and Ilford to be as profitable as possible in their core businesses, so as to keep our favourite analog products available. I cringe at suggestions that they diversify (this story) or assume production of marginal products (Polaroid material).

Photo Engineer · Feb 18, 2008

Jaan;

This is exactly what Kodak found. And it was exactly their error back 20 years ago or so.

PE

polaski · Feb 18, 2008

It doesn't always work out well.

Folks I knew in the 1960's expanded into pharmaceuticals. Then, as now, things don't always work out as neatly as one would wish.

keithwms · Feb 18, 2008

polaski said:
Folks I knew in the 1960's expanded into pharmaceuticals. Then, as now, things don't always work out as neatly as one would wish.

That depends if you're a seller or a user...

Photo Engineer · Feb 18, 2008

Keith;

Both! Ever hear of side effects?

PE

keithwms · Feb 18, 2008

I'll try again.

polaski said:
Folks I knew in the 1960's expanded into pharmaceuticals. Then, as now, things don't always work out as neatly as one would wish.

That depends if you're a pusher or an addict...

(truth be told, I wasn't around in the 60s, but I am sure there were a number of well-intended pharmaceutical events....)

Photo Engineer · Feb 18, 2008

Thalidomide comes to mind. But it might have been a bit later.

PE

firecracker · Feb 20, 2008

Fujifilm has been getting into the area of cosmetics and health food products:

http://www.fujifilm.co.jp/press/ffnr0039.html

The top and the bottom show their new skin-care products. The middle one shows supplement tablets and bevarage. These must have been around since 2006 or so.

And there was an ad in the newspaper today about another product also.

Photo Engineer · Feb 20, 2008

There are so many products in Japan already called 'Fuji', how would one tell which came from Fuji Film?

It is like Meiji as a product name.

PE

firecracker · Feb 21, 2008

Photo Engineer said:
There are so many products in Japan already called 'Fuji', how would one tell which came from Fuji Film?

It is like Meiji as a product name.

PE

Or Asahi, which even has a few different ways of spelling. I know.

Anyhow, the ad on the new cosmetic product by Fujifilm I just saw said something like, "Fujifilm has been successful making people look beautiful/pretty with its advanced technology in the film business and now is trying something new in the field of cosmetics." It was kind of odd to me because the package said exactly Fujifilm. I don't have the link to it so I checked the site and got a different one which I posted.

Now is this emerging in the U.S. as well? Is Fujifilm selling facial cream and things like that for women?

firecracker · Feb 21, 2008

Oh, by the way, in Japan, Ilford photo products have been handled by a pharmaceutical company called Chugai for years. Chugai is the official importer/distributor for Ilford in the Japanese market.

Photo Engineer · Feb 21, 2008

Chugai is also a large chemical company. In fact, IIRC they were a chemical company before getting into pharmaceuticals. We used to use large quantities of Chugai chemicals in the AF in Japan, and I used to buy Chugai photo chemicals in little photo shops for my own use. I think I probably have some tiny glass stoppered bottles of Chugai chemicals here somewhere.

PE

Fujifilm Expanding into Pharmaceuticals

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