Success and failure are the highest and lowest points on a rotating wheel. And depending upon the speed and pattern of motion, both points change their positions. The rule applies to very important enterprises too, and each of them has its own life cycle. Whatever rises is subject to decline, and whatever is begun is destined to fail one day. Regardless of being small or big and being famous or unknown, all enterprises do face some failures in their life cycle, but it takes more than a few and small failures to destroy them completely.

1. RMS Titanic

The Royal Mail Ship Titanic of the White Star Line is iconic to a huge disaster. In 1907 the entrepreneurs Bruce Ismay and Lord Pirrie pondered upon competing with Canard’s luxury ocean liners. They conceived a competitive line of luxury liners and realized it in the form of three ships; Olympic, Titanic, and Britannic. The passenger liner Titanic collided with an ice berg in the Atlantic Ocean near the coast of Newfoundland en route from Southampton to New York during her maiden voyage on April 14, 1912 just shortly before midnight. Within two to three hours of the collision, the ship sank, causing 1,517 deaths, an unsurpassed peacetime tragic disaster. Neighboring ships had reported the presence of icebergs to the Titanic which carelessly continued speedily towards her destined end. Carpathia, another ship picked up the S.O.S. signals of the Titanic, but it was too far away and could rescue only a few. How sad to perceive that the Titanic’s band was playing when the ship was sinking!

2. Flooz.com

Famous entrepreneur and iVillage co-founder Robert Levitan tried to develop an Internet currency somewhat like the airline frequent flier programs or grocery store stamp books. The name Flooz was derived from the Arabic ‘Floos’ meaning ‘money.’ Users could purchase this type of currency for onward utilization directly from Flooz.com or accumulate credit as a promotional bonus offered by the Internet business. The idea prompted by Whoopi Goldberg’s TV series advertisements never did work, and Flooz as medium of exchange was not accepted. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) notified Flooz in 2001 that a Russian organized criminal body was misusing Flooz for money laundering. The company closed on August 26, 2001 rendering all unused Flooz credits worthless, and Flooz exhausted the $36-$50 million in venture capital within a short tenure of its launching.

3. Swissair Ag (Schweizerische Lufverkehr)

Swissair was founded on March 26, 1931 with its headquarter being Zurich Airport, Kloten, Switzerland. The entrepreneur is the key person of any organization, and for Swissair, he was Mario Corti as its last CEO. Once reputed as the ‘Flying Bank’ on account its financial strength, Swissair, the national airline of Switzerland, could not survive the repercussions of the September 11 attack. Its late 90s expensive Hunter Strategy had already weakened it notably. The Swiss federal government tried to keep it alive till March 31, 2002 when it succumbed to its self-inflicted injury and ceased operations.

4. Tucker Automobiles

Entrepreneur Preston Tucker, who was an automotive engineer, conceived the idea of producing a completely new passenger automobile in 1947. Along with his associates he leased a former Dodge Aircraft plant in Chicago for the venture. Only 51 Tucker cars were produced when the company was involved in cases of fraud. The Tucker Automobiles company was constrained to go out of business shortly after that. The fatal flaw was to offer the customers buying accessories before the car was produced.

5. Polaroid Corporation

Edwin H. Land founded the Polaroid Corporation in 1937 with its headquarters in Minnetonka, Minnesota, U.S. Its key persons were Scott W. Hardy (CEO) and Lady Gaga as Creative Director. Polaroid developed Dufaycolor process based on Polavision, which failed on account of the introduction of videotape-based systems. Consequently, the products were disposed of as job lots at cost which was an immense loss to the company. Polaroid Scanners also could not compete with Nikon and Minolta parallel products. On October 11, 2001 Polaroid Corporation filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy and almost all of the company’s assets including the name ‘Polaroid Corporation’ were acquired by a subsidiary of Bank One.

6. Commodore Computers

Commodore International, Limited was a computer hardware industry founded by Jack Tramiel in 1994 with its headquarters in West Chester, Pennsylvania, U.S. Irving Gold was its main investor and chairman. The company produced the Commodore PET, Commodore VIC 20, Commodore 128, and Amiga. In 1982 the company marketed the world’s best-selling desktop computer. But on account of various causes it could not survive and declared bankruptcy in April, 1994 when it was bought by Escom which too went bankrupt.

7. Fokker

The first airplanes Anthony Fokker made were Fokker Spin. Having sold many of them to the German Army, he capitalized on them and  founded his first company Fokker Airplane in Berlin. Later he moved to Gorries suburb southwest of Schwerin, Germany he founded Fokker Avitak GmbH on February, 1912. The Fokker Company headquarters was moved to Amsterdam, Netherlands in 1919. The year 1920 was the best for Fokker when it was a great success with its F. VIIa/3m trimotor passenger aircraft used by 54 airlines capturing 40 per cent of the U.S. market. On January 22, 1996 the Board of Directors of Daimler-Benz decided to disassociate from Fokker, and on March 15, the Fokker Company was declared bankrupt.

8.  Pan Am

Juan T. Trippe merged three companies and founded Pan Am in 1927. It was an American cultural icon. President Franklin Roosevelt flew aboard Pan Am’s Dixie Clipper in 1943. During one of the most tragic airline crashes that blew up over Lockerbie, Scotland shortly after departing from New York, killing 270 people, Pan Am sold its London route rights to United Airlines in October, 1990. It filed for bankruptcy protection on Jan 8, 1991 with its ultimate shutdown on December 4, 1991.

9. Atkins Nutritional, Inc.

Dr.Robert Atkins founded Atkins Nutritional, Inc. in 1989. The philosphy behind the use of the Atkins diet is to change the source of energy and to get the required calories from proteins and stored fat instead of sugars from carbohydrates. It is sort of a low-carb food which was easy in that it does not tighten the quantitative consumption of food but decreases hunger with a consequent low-calorie intake. Following the death of its founder and the decline in the demand for Atkins products, Atkins Nutritional, Inc. filed bankruptcy.

10. Woolworths Group plc

Frank Winfield Woolworth founded Woolworth’s first British store in Liverpool, Merseyside, England in 1909. Woolworths Group owned a high street retail chain with a wide range of products like: Bertram Books, Ladybird Children’s Clothing, Chad Valley toys, Worthit! Value ranges, Candy ‘pick ‘n’ mix’ sweets. The general public referred to it as ‘Woolies’ which played a role in the success of the Beatles and introduced Madonna to the rest of the world. On November, 2008 the trading of shares in Woolworths Group plc were suspended, and all 807 Woolworth’s stores were closed between December 27 and January, 2009 with the consequent loss of 27,000 jobs.

Conclusion:

A spontaneous rise very often subsides like foam, and it may be safely concluded that the enterprises that progressed at a slow and steady rate while taking good care of their contributing values did last longer and could survive better under adverse conditions.
Ironically, sometimes the failure of one is a great success for the other. The RMS Titanic was a big wreck, but the Titanic movie was a big hit.