Reports say Kodak will sell Kettering business to Xerox

A Kodak vice president of digital printing talks about Kodak Prosper printers at the company’s Kettering plant in this 2013 photo. TY GREENLEES / STAFF

A Kodak vice president of digital printing talks about Kodak Prosper printers at the company’s Kettering plant in this 2013 photo. TY GREENLEES / STAFF

Kodak is nearing a sale of its Kettering inkjet printing business to Xerox, according to national media reports.

A Kodak spokesman at the company’s Rochester, N.Y. headquarters declined to respond to those reports Tuesday.

“Unfortunately we have not made any announcement and cannot provide any additional details,” spokesman Nick Rangel said in an email.

The Prosper inkjet printing system was developed in part at the company’s Miami Valley Research Park operations in Kettering, where a few years ago the company had close to 500 employees.

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In fact, Kettering in the past has been identified as the company’s largest operation outside New York.

A New York TV station and a print industry publication both say there is speculation the company will soon announce a buyer for its high-speed inkjet business. The industry publication identified the buyer as Xerox, citing an unnamed “source close to the situation.”

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Originally, Kodak wanted to sell the Kettering business unit last year, but then indicated the sale would likely happen in 2017.

In 2010, when then-Kodak Chairman and Chief Executive Antonio Perez visited Kettering and the company held an shareholders meeting there, Perez called the Prosper printing system “a revolution in the printing industry.”

“The product line that is managed out of Dayton is one of the largest opportunities we have in the company,” Perez said at that time.

Today, Jeff Clarke is CEO of Kodak.

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