They could have been like Facebook, Microsoft and Google, but something went wrong. These companies have become a shadow of their former greatness [TOPtech]

Over the last decades, the new technologies industry has witnessed many successes, but also spectacular disasters. Here are four companies where “something” went wrong.

YAHOO

In the 1990s, Yahoo was almost synonymous with the Internet. The service offered access to the latest news, e-mail and a popular search engine. The company grew rapidly and took over competing businesses. So what went wrong?

The first blow was the bursting of the Internet stock market bubble in the early 2000s. As a result, Yahoo stock, which was still worth $119 in January 2001, was worth only $4 at the end of August.

The real nemesis for Yahoo turned out to be Google. The Mountain View startup offered a better and more precise search engine, which resulted in an outflow of users from Yahoo services.

The company tried to save itself by escaping forward, but subsequent large investments ended only in burning cash. In 2016, Yahoo fell into the hands of Verizon, and today it is in a completely different place than its former market rival.

NOKIA

Back in 2007, Nokia was the hegemon in the mobile phone market with over a billion users. It was then that the famous issue of the magazine “Forbes” appeared, which on the cover asked if anyone is able to threaten the “mobile king”.

This gauntlet was taken up by Steve Jobs, who in the same year presented the world with the first iPhone. And started the smartphone revolution. Confident Nokia managers not only did not sense the threat from Apple, but later also underestimated the growing strength of Android.

There could only be one effect. In six years, Nokia’s share of the mobile device market has fallen from over 50 to just 3 percent. Microsoft tried to save the famous brand from the crisis, which in 2014 took over the mobile branch of Nokia for over USD 7 billion.

The beginnings were promising, but it soon turned out that Nokia’s Windows Mobile-powered smartphones have no chance against iPhones and Android devices.

Currently, the legendary brand is owned by HMD Global. However, it is too late to conquer the smartphone market.

ATARI

At the turn of the 70s and 80s of the 21st century, ATARI was one of the giants of the video games, consoles and computers market. It is to this American company that we owe the famous Pong and the ATARI 2600 console. The golden era ended in 1983, when the game market crashed.

The company founded by Nolan Bushnell was also not helped by internal conflicts and the release of such duds as the Steven Spielberg-based game ET, which is still considered one of the greatest embarrassments in the history of the gaming industry.

ATARI attempted to return to its glory days in the early 1990s with the release of the ATARI Falcon computer and Jaguar console. Unfortunately, both devices turned out to be a sales failure.

KODAK

The history of KODAK is one of the most spectacular examples of its inability to adapt to market trends and a changing world.

The American concern has been a tycoon in the photography market for years. It was Kodak who introduced the first amateur camera and the first color film, setting the standard for 35mm photography.

Unfortunately, Kodak has become a victim of its success. In 1975, the company produced the world’s first digital camera and stood still. Kodak did not want to move towards digital photography because he was afraid that it would ruin his big analog business.

The 1990s and the beginning of the 21st century saw a series of successive disastrous business decisions. For example, in 2001, KODAK acquired the Ofoto service, which was used to store and share photos.

The company had the ancestor of Instagram in its hands and turned it into a shop for printing digital prints. In 2013, KODAK was on the verge of bankruptcy. In the end, he managed to escape the ax, but now the company no longer has much influence in the photographic industry.