Kodak loses title as top employer

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Eastman Kodak Co.’s local employment fell 21 percent in 2004, as the imaging giant lost its perennial ranking as the region’s largest private-sector employer to the University of Rochester/Strong Health.
Kodak’s drop in local staffers-part of a worldwide cut from 64,000 in 2003 to 54,800 in 2004-reflects job cuts and the sale of a major local operation to ITT Industries Inc.
Kodak now ranks as the second-largest employer with 16,300 jobs here, down from 20,600 at the close of 2003, the Rochester Business Journal’s new private-sector employers list shows. (Part one of the list appears on page 9.)
UR/Strong reported its full-time employment rose nearly 4 percent, from 13,400 to 13,935. But part-time employment boosts UR’s total work force to 16,565-265 more workers than Kodak. Officials at Kodak declined to provide a breakdown of part-time and full-time staff.
Kodak spokesman Gerard Meuchner said the company is going through a major digital transformation and has reduced employment worldwide to remain competitive. The reduction in Rochester reflects those efforts.
Over the past five years, UR’s total employment has grown from 14,660 to 16,565, or 13 percent; over the same period, Kodak has shrunk from 24,600 to 16,300, or a 34 percent decline.
The bulk of the growth over the past several years at UR has come in the medical and clinical care areas of the university, said Robert Kraus, associate vice president of public relations.
“It is not our goal to be No. 1,” Kraus said. “The UR’s concerns and feelings of responsibility for the community have never depended on being No. 1, No. 2 or No. 3. It’s where our employees live; it’s important to us.”
The employment numbers also signal the region’s traditional manufacturing economy is being supplanted by the knowledge economy, he added.
“It accentuates the fact that education and health care are a greater part of the economy,” Kraus said.
Kodak in January 2004 announced a new cost reduction program that would eliminate one-third of its worldwide facility footprint and up to 15,000 jobs. Through the end of 2004, the company had eliminated 9,650 positions worldwide.
A major block of former Kodak staffers, however, now work for ITT Industries, which makes its appearance on the private-sector employers list at No. 13, with 1,920 employees.
In August, Kodak completed the sale of its Remote Sensing Systems operation to ITT Industries for $725 million in cash. The nearly 2,000 RSS employees transferred to ITT Industries, which has established a new space systems division in Rochester.
Kodak’s local job total peaked at more than 60,000 in 1982 and steadily has decreased since then. Kodak’s total employment worldwide, reported at 54,800, is smaller than its Rochester-based staff in the early 1980s.
Kodak officials have described the downsizing as necessary as the company shifts from a traditional, film-based imaging company to digital enterprise. In some instances, that has meant additional jobs as the company has made acquisitions and boosted employment in some operations.
Among the other local companies showing the largest employment increases over the past year are Paychex Inc., which boosted its local staff by 9 percent to 2,294; Harris Corp. RF Communications Division, where employment climbed 23 percent to 1,600; and Verizon Wireless Inc., which jumped 24 percent to 1,025.
Among the traditional Big Three, Bausch & Lomb Inc. saw employment climb 19 percent to 1,500, while Xerox Corp. trimmed local staff by 3 percent to 8,325.
Those firms showing major dips include Rochester Gas and Electric Corp., down 31 percent to 1,074. The energy company’s employment, however, was reduced by more than 440 workers with its sale of R.E. Ginna Nuclear Power Plant LLC to Constellation Energy Group LLC.
After UR/Strong and Kodak, Wegmans Food Markets Inc. ranked as the third-largest private-sector employer, followed by Xerox and ViaHealth.
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04/08/05 (C) Rochester Business Journal