Polaroid was an American company best known for its instant film and cameras. The company was founded in 1937 by Edwin H. Land, to exploit the use of its Polaroid polarizing polymer. Land ran the company until 1981. Its peak employment was 21,000 in 1978, and its peak revenue was $3 billion in 1991.When the original Polaroid Corporation was declared bankrupt in 2001, its brand and assets were sold off. The "new" Polaroid formed as a result, itself declared bankruptcy in 2008, resulting in a further sale to Polish billionaire Wiaczesław Smołokowski. In May 2017, the brand and intellectual property of Polaroid Corporation were acquired by the largest shareholder of the Impossible Project, which had originally started out in 2008 by producing new instant films for Polaroid cameras. The Impossible Project was renamed Polaroid Originals in September 2017, and in March 2020 was renamed to simply Polaroid.