Ortwin Sam Schneider-Freyermuth (born November 1958) is a German American video game executive, entertainment lawyer and film producer. He currently holds the position of co-founder (together with Chris Roberts), vice-chairman and general counsel of Cloud Imperium Games. He is also known for having been the CEO of film production company Capella Films and for producing the 1997 director's cut version of Wolfgang Petersen's Das Boot.
Biography
Ortwin Freyermuth studied law at the University of Göttingen and at the University of California, Los Angeles, where he completed his Master degree with a thesis on film distribution and copyright law in 1986. In the early 1990s, he was part of a group of German film producers who pioneered a new business model, acquiring the production and distribution rights for several Hollywood films with both financial and popular success. After having previously served as a legal advisor to Chris Roberts' Ascendant Pictures and other production companies, he founded Cloud Imperium Games with Roberts in 2011 to create the video game Star Citizen.
Ortwin Freyermuth is the brother of German journalist and author Gundolf S. Freyermuth.
Academic works
- Deutsch, Erwin; Schneider-Freyermuth, Ortwin; Koenig, Ulrich (January 1985). Die Vervielfältigung von Filmen durch Hochschulen und ihre Einrichtungen : rechtliche Probleme untersucht am Beispiel des IWF- Filmverleihs (in German). Berlin; Tokyo: Springer (published 1985). ISBN 978-3-540-15728-1. OCLC 38444169.
- Ortwin S Freyermuth (1986). Film distribution and modern video technology : the shift of motion picture distribution into the private sphere and its impact on copyright protection (Thesis (LL. M.)). Los Angeles: University of California. OCLC 16163525.