Smith Corona has voluntarily filed for bankruptcy to facilitate a buyout by Carolina Wholesale Office Machine Company, a wholesale distributor of office equipment and supplies. Carolina Wholesale plans to “organize Smith Corona as a separate operating entity with a strong focus on the core typewriter and supplies products”. So the name will live on, and it does have brand impact, so it should. The press release includes interesting historical information about Smith Corona’s bumpy ride along the typewriter obsolescence trail. Smith Corona had previously filed Chapter 11 in 1995 and came out of it in 1997, having successfully reorganized from a manufacturing company to sales and marketing, obtaining all products from third party sources. But that success was short-lived. This past April they were delisted from Nasdaq because they no longer satisfied the financial requirements. The stock is at $0.34, with 3,220,180 shares outstanding among 450 holders. For more nostalgia, I found this page full of typewriter links, including a 1996 Popular Mechanics article on their 130 year history.