Kodak Plans Huge Layoffs

Once again, the knives are getting sharpened at Eastman Kodak Co.

The world’s biggest photography company is preparing to lay off as many as 10,000 of its 95,000 employees to trim costs by anywhere from $500 million to $800 million a year, Wall Street analysts predicted Thursday.

At a meeting with investors and analysts in New York next Tuesday, chief executive George Fisher will unveil the latest in a series of overhauls dating to 1983 aimed at reviving sluggish sales and profits and beating back increasingly fierce competition from Japan’s Fuji Photo Film Co. Analysts expect Kodak will shed a variety of money-losing businesses and products, trim its sales force by 10 percent and refocus research costs to curb this year’s projected losses of $400 million in digital photography.