As a creative content company with a history stretching back nearly 190 years, Bertelsmann is engaged in cultural efforts at various levels. Its “Culture@Bertelsmann” activities are focused on preserving important cultural assets and making them accessible to a broad public, e.g. through digitization or exhibitions and concerts. For many years, Bertelsmann has organized the popular UFA Film Nights, a silent film festival in Berlin, and has repeatedly acted as the main sponsor for the digital restoration of important silent films. The Group also owns the Archivio Storico Ricordi in Milan, which houses a wealth of unique testimonies to 200 years of Italian opera history. Bertelsmann is indexing the archive holdings according to the latest standards and makes thousands of documents, set and costume designs, libretti, and items of business correspondence publicly accessible online. With the “Blaues Sofa” (Blue Sofa) literature format, Bertelsmann and its partners ZDF, Deutschlandfunk Kultur, and 3sat have provided authors with a prominent stage for their latest works for over 20 years.

UFA is comprised of the production units UFA Fiction, UFA Serial Drama, UFA Show & Factual, and UFA Documentary. Its wide-ranging product portfolio offers a unique variety of complementary programs. UFA Fiction realizes high-quality fictional productions such as TV movies, series, serials, and TV events. UFA Show & Factual creates top-notch shows across all genres, from talent and game shows to quiz, panel, and dating shows, to comedy and music shows, as well as high-quality factual programs – emotional, journalistic and documentary. UFA Serial Drama is the leading provider of industrial series productions, while UFA Documentary focuses on documentaries, hybrid documentary, and serial features.

With currently more than 30 serial program brands, UFA has more long-running formats on the market than any other producer. UFA sets and develops trends with its programs, while also remaining committed to proven ideas and traditions. Its impressive track record is made up of ratings successes in series, serials and shows like “SOKO Leipzig,” “GZSZ,” “Alles was zählt,” “Unter Uns,” “Ein starkes Team,” “Wer weiß denn sowas?” “Deutschland sucht den Superstar” (Germany’s Got Talent), “Take Me Out” and “Sag die Wahrheit.” Outstanding high-end drama series, event-scale TV series, and made-for-TV movies such as “Unsere Mütter, unsere Väter” (Generation War), “Ku’damm 56/59/63,” “Charité 1/2/3,” “Deutschland 83/86/89,” “Hackerville,” “Altes Land,” “8 Zeugen,” and “Faking Hitler,” and feature films such as “Der Junge muss an die frische Luft,” “Ich war noch niemals in New York” and “Leander Hausmanns Stasikomödie” as well as successful factual entertainment such as “Bauer sucht Frau” (Farmer Wants A Wife), and social documentaries such as “Hartz und herzlich.”