Company: KODK
Filing Date: 2025-03-17
Form Type: 10-K
Source: 0000950170-25-040256
Chunk: 34

Company: EASTMAN KODAK CO
Filing Date: 2025-03-17
Form: 10-K
Item: Item 1A
Chunk 34
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 with these third parties which govern the use of our trademarks and requires our licensees to abide by quality control standards with respect to the goods and services they provide under the trademarks. Although Kodak makes efforts to police the use of our trademarks by our licensees, there can be no assurance these efforts will be sufficient to ensure the licensees abide by the 

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terms of their licenses. In the event Kodak’s licensees fail to do so, our trademark rights could be diluted and our reputation harmed by our licensees’ activities. Also, failure by Kodak and our licensees to sufficiently exploit any of Kodak’s trademarks in any markets could erode Kodak’s trademark rights with respect to the relevant trademarks. Because the laws and enforcement regimes of certain countries do not protect proprietary rights to the same degree as those in the United States, in certain jurisdictions Kodak may be unable to adequately prevent such unauthorized uses, which could result in impairment of our trademark rights. 

Kodak has made substantial investments in new, proprietary technologies and has filed patent applications and obtained patents to protect our intellectual property rights in these technologies as well as the interests of our licensees. There can be no assurance Kodak’s patent applications will be approved, any patents issued will be of sufficient scope or strength to provide us with meaningful protection, or such patents will not be challenged by third parties. Furthermore, Kodak may fail to accurately predict all of the countries where patent protection will ultimately be desirable, and if we fail to timely file a patent application in any such country, we may be precluded from doing so at a later date. The patents issuing may vary in scope of coverage depending on the country in which such patents issue.

In addition, the intellectual property rights of others could inhibit Kodak’s ability to conduct our business. Other companies may hold patents on technologies used in Kodak’s industries and some of these companies may be aggressively seeking to expand, enforce or license their patent portfolios. Third parties may claim Kodak and our customers, licensees or other parties indemnified by us are infringing upon their intellectual property rights.

Such claims may be made by competitors seeking to block or limit Kodak’s access to certain markets. Additionally, certain individuals and groups have purchased intellectual property assets for the sole purpose of making claims of infringement and attempting to extract settlements from companies like Kodak. Even if we believe the claims are without merit, these claims may have the following negative impacts on our business:

•claims can be time consuming and costly to defend and may distract management