Statement from Harman Technology regarding recent sale to Pemberstone Ventures Ltd.

[Sean]

Hi All,

This new thread is a continuation of the original thread here:

(there was a url link here which no longer exists)

That thread was breaking the news of Ilford's sale mentioned in their following press release:
http://www.ilfordphoto.com/pressroom/article.asp?n=211

I started this new thread as Ilford have now made a statement on APUG and I feel we are better to continue the discussions based on that as the original post (this is an effort to ensure that Ilford's statement to APUG is not lost in the mix).

Statement from Harman Technology Ltd

Apologies for joining the discussion so late, yesterday was a little hectic...

I just wanted to post a something on here as I know Simon is a regular contributor and many will be expecting a response. Firstly I have to tell you that Simon exited the business when it was sold. Simon may well continue to be an APUG contributor in a personal capacity however I don't know that for sure.

Many of you have already read the press release about the sale of the business. I don't really have anything more to add on that front, other that to say it's definitely business as usual. This is an exciting time for all involved in the business, I've worked for Harman / Ilford for 28 years and this is yet another chapter in our story !

Harman will continue to support APUG and my Technical services team (David, Sue and Myself) will monitor and contribute to APUG. I have set up a "Harman Tech Service" APUG member which we will share between us.

Our primary technical support will continue to be via the "Contact Us" section of the Ilford Photo website.

Neil

Neil Hibbs

I'm sure more details will follow and I will update Neil to this thread.

Thanks,
Sean

 

[Sirius Glass]

Thank you for clearing the air and restarting the thread based of verifiable facts and statements.

 

[alanrockwood]

Well, I guess that's one way to throw cold water on the discussion.

 

[Sal Santamaura]

…And I do hope the new owners consider it a wise investment to continue the support of APUG.

If I were Ilford in current form, I would strongly consider if it actually is a wise investment to support this site and possibly look at an entirely different one to be more effective...

It takes big brass ones to come here and discourage HARMAN from continuing its Partner relationship with APUG. Especially since, like me, you're just a member here and don't provide the site any financial support. Now you post in a way intended to drive that support away. Outrageous.

...The reason I say this is that for a variety of reasons...

And you say things like that about other forums you post on too. What are the real reasons? And, why do you keep coming back to them for trash talking?

...I believe there might be better investments when it comes to how well APUG promotes the future of film. I think it ranks pretty poorly in that regard and some of the reasons are the consistently negative attitudes of certain members who happen to post a ton keeping threads like this high on the popularity mast...

It seems that, for the last decade, the former owners of HARMAN technology Ltd. decided APUG was their best possible investment of both cash and time. They apparently did fairly well during a period when other silver halide film/paper manufacturers went bankrupt and/or ceased operating. They participated in no other forums. Given that the firm was just purchased, a wise course for its new owner might be not to mess with that success. Expanding promotion elsewhere doesn't need to be accompanied by abandoning this venue. Even if you don't agree with some of the participants here.

...I just wish it had a much stronger showing of the younger people I often associate with...

Even though I am far from a young person, I look forward to visiting and participating at the Forum you ought to found. That's the only way you'll ever be satisfied with the character of such a bulletin board. In other words, moderating it and completely controlling every post.

 

[MattKing]

APUG is the best forum by far when it comes to darkroom discussions.

So Ilford paper and chemistry are reasons enough to continue here.

 

[peter k.]

APUG is the best forum by far when it comes to darkroom discussions.

So Ilford paper and chemistry are reasons enough to continue here.

++

 

[Roger Cole]

APUG is the best forum by far when it comes to darkroom discussions.

So Ilford paper and chemistry are reasons enough to continue here.

++

+++

It doesn't take much to add another forum into the mix of other online support.

 

[BrianShaw]

It takes big brass ones to come here and discourage HARMAN from continuing its Partner relationship with APUG. Especially since, like me, you're just a member here and don't provide the site any financial support. Now you post in a way intended to drive that support away. Outrageous.

And you say things like that about other forums you post on too. What are the real reasons? And, why do you keep coming back to them for trash talking?


It seems that, for the last decade, the former owners of HARMAN technology Ltd. decided APUG was their best possible investment of both cash and time. They apparently did fairly well during a period when other silver halide film/paper manufacturers went bankrupt and/or ceased operating. They participated in no other forums. Given that the firm was just purchased, a wise course for its new owner might be not to mess with that success. Expanding promotion elsewhere doesn't need to be accompanied by abandoning this venue. Even if you don't agree with some of the participants here.


Even though I am far from a young person, I look forward to visiting and participating at the Forum you ought to found. That's the only way you'll ever be satisfied with the character of such a bulletin board. In other words, moderating it and completely controlling every post.

Plus, plus, plus, plus!

 

[Nathan King]

I sincerely wish Simon and the rest of the departing management the best. Hopefully Simon will continue to share his expertise and passion for analog photography with the community in a personal capacity. I'm looking forward to seeing how Ilford continues to develop and improve upon the line of products currently offered.

 

[alanrockwood]

APUG is the best forum by far when it comes to darkroom discussions.

So Ilford paper and chemistry are reasons enough to continue here.

A discussion about the sale of Harman now morphs into a discussion of paper and chemistry. I get it. Let's just pretend like the sale of the company never happened and just focus on paper and chemistry.

 

[Prof_Pixel]

Let's just pretend like the sale of the company never happened and just focus on paper and chemistry.

Que sera, sera (Whatever will be, will be)


Nothing we can say or do here will change anything.

 

[Old-N-Feeble]

Thanks, Doris.

 

[MattKing]

A discussion about the sale of Harman now morphs into a discussion of paper and chemistry. I get it. Let's just pretend like the sale of the company never happened and just focus on paper and chemistry.

That was a response to an earlier comment which opined that APUG wasn't the best place for the new owners of Harman to continue to put some of their resources. It seemed to me that that comment ignored APUG's particular strengths with respect to the darkroom.

 

[pschwart]

Our new owners will assist us to connect more effectively to this younger generation in the future, and we will prioritise this as our main goal over the next five years.

- Anyone care to speculate on what this means?
- Do we know the demographic of subscriber and non-subscriber APUG members?

 

[Sirius Glass]

Our new owners will assist us to connect more effectively to this younger generation in the future, and we will prioritise this as our main goal over the next five years.

- Anyone care to speculate on what this means?
- Do we know the demographic of subscriber and non-subscriber APUG members?

They want to increase their profits [regardless of the costs(?)].

 

[alanrockwood]

Our new owners will assist us to connect more effectively to this younger generation in the future, and we will prioritise this as our main goal over the next five years.

- Anyone care to speculate on what this means?
- Do we know the demographic of subscriber and non-subscriber APUG members?

Sounds like prioritizing on Holga and Diana to me.

 

[Roger Cole]

Our new owners will assist us to connect more effectively to this younger generation in the future, and we will prioritise this as our main goal over the next five years.

- Anyone care to speculate on what this means?
- Do we know the demographic of subscriber and non-subscriber APUG members?

Sucky C41 films with whacked out wrong colors at the expense of superb quality black and white materials such as we have now from Ilford?

Plastic toy cameras branded Ilford?

Sorry, I'm being snarky and don't mean to be. It just seems to me, too often, that the pitch to a young demographic comes at the expense of traditional quality.

I think I'm getting curmudgeonly in my old age. I went to bed one night about 30 and woke up last month 52.

 

[BradS]

Hello and welcome to APUG Sue, David and Neil. Very pleased to have you. Best wishes!

 

[pbromaghin]

It takes big brass ones to come here and discourage HARMAN from continuing its Partner relationship with APUG. Especially since, like me, you're just a member here and don't provide the site any financial support. Now you post in a way intended to drive that support away. Outrageous.

And you say things like that about other forums you post on too. What are the real reasons? And, why do you keep coming back to them for trash talking?


It seems that, for the last decade, the former owners of HARMAN technology Ltd. decided APUG was their best possible investment of both cash and time. They apparently did fairly well during a period when other silver halide film/paper manufacturers went bankrupt and/or ceased operating. They participated in no other forums. Given that the firm was just purchased, a wise course for its new owner might be not to mess with that success. Expanding promotion elsewhere doesn't need to be accompanied by abandoning this venue. Even if you don't agree with some of the participants here.


Even though I am far from a young person, I look forward to visiting and participating at the Forum you ought to found. That's the only way you'll ever be satisfied with the character of such a bulletin board. In other words, moderating it and completely controlling every post.

Piss on him. Let's move on.

 

[UKJohn]

I teach in an FE college in the West Midlands the majority of our students are 16 – 19 year olds (we do run HE courses that attract more mature learners) we teach both analogue and digital, we feel that film photography and darkroom is an integral part of the learning process and provides a good foundation for learners future studies. From my own experience through observation and talking to learners is that on the whole they find film and darkroom really exciting and interesting and something completely new that is far removed from sitting in front of a computer screen. In fact every year we get learners who prefer analogue over digital.

From my experience I would suggest this is where the future of analogue photography lies and where to a larger degree it needs to be marketed but in doing so the high quality products analogue offers also needs to be maintained which from Ilford's statement seems to suggest that they will be doing.

 

[railwayman3]

TBH, something would have happened sooner or later. Directors/shareholders not in the first flush of youth, who needed to realise their investment and effort at some stage. And their work with the landlords to develop a modern, smaller and more viable factory being thwarted by nimby-ism by the locals.
I'd have sold up too, particularly if I was still young enough to do something else!

 

[Ian Grant]

I teach in an FE college in the West Midlands the majority of our students are 16 – 19 year olds (we do run HE courses that attract more mature learners) we teach both analogue and digital, we feel that film photography and darkroom is an integral part of the learning process and provides a good foundation for learners future studies. From my own experience through observation and talking to learners is that on the whole they find film and darkroom really exciting and interesting and something completely new that is far removed from sitting in front of a computer screen. In fact every year we get learners who prefer analogue over digital.

From my experience I would suggest this is where the future of analogue photography lies and where to a larger degree it needs to be marketed but in doing so the high quality products analogue offers also needs to be maintained which from Ilford's statement they will be doing.

You've summed it up well and from my experience of going to your local (Wolverhampton) camera fair regularly there's a lot of young people buying film cameras.

Here in the UK at least we are seeing a revival of interest in analog photography and a major chemists chain (drug store) is once again stocking Ilford films in most of their stores. We are seeing some of that revival here on APUG as well with younger people who've only previously used Digital joining.

Ilford have come up with some new ideas to help promote analog photography, their Local Darkroom scheme for instance, I had a young wheel chair bound student using mine earlier this year. There's room for more ideas though.

More importantly we are turning the tide against those who constantly told us film and dark-room work was dead and what ever we think of Lomography and Diana style cameras that movement has gone a huge way to changing perceptions of young people who only grew up in a digital world and introducing them to film.

The future for all film & paper companies is increasing the youg user base.

Ian

 

[removed account4]

Sounds like prioritizing on Holga and Diana to me.

GOOD

chemical photography isn't all hassle-blads, leicas and "large format"...

 

[blockend]

Before the previous thread closed there was some dissent from my point that there has been no new research into film technology. I can't give a precise date for tabular grain innovation, but that was the last "new" thing and I strongly suspect the research behind it was not very recent. By research I mean people writing PhDs that trickle down into products on the shelves, not manufacturing tweaks.

Some will say research is not relevant, film is what it is take it or leave it, and they might have a point. However this effectively leaves a product based on a historical process created on historical machinery, never a healthy long term prospect. The technical details behind T-grain and similar technology seem to have disappeared from the web, so I can't offer a definitive date to the concept, someone else may provide an answer.

 

[Ricardo Miranda]

(...)So for now, I'd say all of us should just continue on as we have been, and don't panic-hoard. That might help them now, but it would spell doom for the company after everybody is fat and happy with full freezers.
They might just change a few things and continue on as they have been doing all along.

I fully agree with that.
Every time there is a change of something, there's always those that panic buy.

To Harman:

You said this:

“We remain totally committed to Analogue Photography, and indeed to all forms of Imaging.Our Product Range is uniquely stable and of the highest quality, and we can assure all of our customers that we will continue to support them in our customary way for the foreseeable future”

That last bit is what worries me.
I would like to see the older commitment to the production of film of the entire range, from Kentmere films to Ilford SFX, to be reiterated.

It would have been better if you had wrote:
"...that we will continue to support them in our customary way as we have always done."

That would spell out any doubts.
As it is, I'm glad I don't depend on your products as I am mainly a Foma customer, but I would miss the Kentmere films.

I hope you can clarify if the new owners intend to have the same commitment as the old ones.
Thank you!