UCI Cinemas
United Cinemas International ( UCI or UCI cinema world ) is a theater company that is part of the Odeon & UCI Cinemas Group. This in turn is owned by Terra Firma Capital Partners. The German office is located in Bochum, the Austrian in Vienna.
History
UCI was founded as a joint venture of Paramount Pictures and Universal Studios, to operate cinemas in the UK. In 1985, UCI opened about 70 miles from London, the first multiplex cinema, which should also have been the first of its kind in Europe.
In the following years, UCI expanded in Europe and later in Japan, China, Taiwan and Brazil. Although the Cinemax Group was founded in 1989, UCI was able to open the first multiplex cinema in Germany in October 1990 in Hürth near Cologne; the competitor Cinemax followed a few months later in Hannover and Essen.
Since 2004 the European UCI companies of the investment company Terra Firma Capital Partners. In early 2006, the UCI cinemas have been incorporated into the likewise been bought by Terra Firma cinema chain ODEON.
In the fall of 2008, four cinemas in the Kinoplex chain were taken from UCI. These are the sites in Flensburg, Wilhelmshaven, Paderborn and Bad Oeynhausen.
The Company
UCI initially pursued an opposite location concept for Cinemax Group and the now insolvent Ufa theater group. While the latter preferred to make the classic central location, UCI moved its new buildings preferably in well-connected to traffic, possibly also densely populated outlying areas to. The Hamburg UCI cinema Othmarschen Park is an example of this concept: It is located right next to a motorway exit of the A7 and close to several residential areas. However, already the fourth opened in Germany UCI cinema was located in the city center.
Overall, the Odeon & UCI Cinemas Group operates in seven countries with 232 cinema screens in 2153. In Germany UCI has 203 screens and 50,220 seats at 23 sites. In Austria, there are 3 locations with 38 screens and 7742 seats.