British multinational cinema company
Vue International
(
vew
, like "view"), is a multinational cinema holding company based in
London
, England. It operates in the United Kingdom, Ireland and Denmark as Vue, with international operations in Germany (as
CinemaxX
); Italy (as
The Space Cinema
); Poland and Lithuania (
Multikino
); Netherlands (
Vue Netherlands
).
History
[
edit
]
Foundation
[
edit
]
The company was founded in 1999 as
Spean Bridge Cinemas
by Stewart Blair, a former executive of
United Artists Theatres
and Tim Richards, a former executive of
Warner Bros. International Theatres
. It was named after a holiday to the Scottish Highland village of the
same name
by Blair.
[1]
2000s
[
edit
]
The first cinema to open was under The Circuit Cinema brand in
Livingston
, Scotland, on 5 October 2000.
[2]
The company was later renamed as
SBC International Cinemas
and opened cinemas in
Faro, Portugal
(closed in 2014) and
Taipei
, Taiwan (still operating as SBC).
[3]
In May 2003, SBC bought
Warner Village Cinemas
from its owners,
Village Roadshow
and
Warner Bros.
, for £250 million. At the time, SBC owned four cinemas, and Warner Village Cinemas owned 36.
[4]
In April 2005, the chain acquired the
Ster Century
chain from Aurora Entertainment; this included the highest grossing cinema in the United Kingdom or Ireland at
Liffey Valley Shopping Centre
in Dublin, Ireland.
[5]
On 20 June 2006, Vue's executive team completed a management buyout of the company with the backing of Bank of Scotland Corporate; the management team retaining a 51% stake. Also, as part of the buyout, Vue took full ownership of the four Village sites it had been operating under contract from Village Roadshow. The private equity firm
Doughty Hanson & Co
acquired Vue in November 2010.
[6]
2010s
[
edit
]
Vue bought the company, Apollo, in May 2012, retaining 14 new sites across the United Kingdom, making it the third largest cinema company in the United Kingdom, behind
Odeon
and
Cineworld
.
[7]
In May 2013, Vue Entertainment acquired
Multikino
, the Polish cinema operator owning thirty cinemas with almost 250 screens in Poland and Baltic countries.
[8]
In June 2013, Doughty Hanson & Co announced it had sold Vue to the Canadian pension funds
Alberta Investment Management Corporation
and
OMERS
for £935 million.
[9]
In November 2014, Vue International acquired The Space Cinema in Italy.
[10]
In March 2015, Vue announced it would build the United Kingdom's first
eSports
arena in cooperation with Gfinity, costing £350,000.
[11]
The Fulham Broadway cinema was converted into a six hundred seat 'Gfinity Arena,' to host e gaming events
[12]
In August 2015, Vue International acquired JT Bioscopen, the second-largest cinema chain in the Netherlands, bringing Vue's number of sites to over 200.
[13]
In June 2018, Vue acquired the Irish operator Showtime Cinemas, adding a further two cinemas to their estate in the United Kingdom and Ireland, now totalling 89 cinemas.
[14]
2020?present
[
edit
]
In March 2020, Vue temporarily closed its cinemas due to the
COVID-19 pandemic
, stating that it would "remain closed until further notice".
[15]
Though numerous lockdowns affected a brief reopening in mid-2020, eventually, all cinemas reopened in May 2021, with COVID restrictions in force until spring 2022.
On 18 May 2020, Vue announced that it would close its single Multikino site in
Riga
, Latvia, after operating for almost 10 years.
[16]
Board
[
edit
]
Locations
[
edit
]
Vue International operates 226 sites and 2,010 screens globally.
[17]
References
[
edit
]
External links
[
edit
]