[1] The original UFA was established as Universum-Film Aktiengesellschaft on December 18, 1917, as a direct response to foreign competition in film and propaganda.

UFA was founded by a consortium headed by Emil Georg von Stauß, a former Deutsche Bank board member.

An early step towards the founding of UFA was taken on January 13, 1917, with the creation of the Bild- und Filmamt (Bufa) by Germany's Supreme Army Command.

Prior to establishing the company, the General Staff had considered taking over the Deutsche Lichtbild-Gesellschaft [de] e. V. (DLG), which had been founded in 1916.

[2] However, after mounting tensions between the company's founding members, Deutsche Bank was able to prevail and implement their approach to film production as a business rather than for military objectives.

Starting in 1922, large ateliers in Neubabelsberg (today's Babelsberg Studio) and on Oberlandstraße in Berlin-Tempelhof were made available for film production.

In 1923, after Decla-Bioscop AG and others were taken over, Erich Pommer became head of all production operations and discovered and fostered many stars, including Emil Jannings, Pola Negri, Conrad Veidt and Lya de Putti.

During this era UFA was a leader in the time of the German Expressionism, experienced a further boom, and emerged as a direct competitor to Hollywood with films such as The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari (1920), Dr. Mabuse the Gambler (1922), Die Nibelungen (1924), Variety (1925) and Faust (1926).

[20][clarification needed] This situation was made even worse as the result of a gag contract (the Parufamet agreement) they had entered into in 1925 with the American companies Paramount Pictures and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.

The new general director was Ludwig Klitzsch; Hugenberg himself took over the chairmanship of the supervisory board; his deputy was banker Emil Georg von Stauß.

In 1928, Erich Pommer was replaced as head of production by Ernst Hugo Correll, who led the company through the transition to talking pictures or "talkies".

Asphalt (German Realism) or entertainment movies such as Melody of the Heart or the musical film The Three from the Filling Station are produced by the UFA.

In 1930, the company enjoyed worldwide success with the film The Blue Angel, starring Marlene Dietrich and Emil Jannings, directed by Joseph von Sternberg.

UFA experienced a new commercial boom in the Nazi era, not least due to the government's protectionist measures, which freed the company from bothersome domestic and foreign competition, sometimes even incorporating their production facilities and staff (see also: National Socialist Film Policy).

On top of that, by occupying almost all of Europe, the Nazi regime also provided UFA with new sales markets, as well as placing distribution outlets in such "neutral" countries as the United States.

UFA's economic boom made it possible to further expand the so-called "star system," which had already been developed in the silent film era.

In addition, as a result of the nationalist German spirit that already dominated the company, UFA was perfectly suited to serve the goals of National Socialist propaganda in film.

In an act of anticipatory obedience to the Nazi regime, UFA management fired several Jewish employees on March 29, 1933.

In the summer of 1933, the Nazi regime created the Film Chamber of the Reich, which adopted regulations officially excluding Jewish filmmakers from all German studios.

In contrast, the main film-policy goal of the Allied occupying forces, under American insistence, consisted in preventing any future accumulation of power in the German film industry.

In 1972, the Riech Group acquired UFA-Theater AG and continued operating the company with a license from Bertelsmann under the UFA's trademark rhombus logo.

The production companies belonging to UFA Berlin have been under the management of Wolf Bauer, Norbert Sauer and Axel Reick since autumn 1991.

In early 1997, the holding society UFA Hamburg (today Cologne) merged with CLT in Luxemburg to form CLT-UFA.

Between 1933 and 1942, the following were house directors at UFA: Carl Boese, Eduard von Borsody, Peter Paul Brauer, Karl Hartl, Georg Jacoby, Gerhard Lamprecht, Herbert Maisch, Paul Martin, Karl Ritter, Reinhold Schünzel (until 1936), Douglas Sirk (until 1937), Hans Steinhoff, Robert A. Stemmle, Viktor Tourjansky, Gustav Ucicky und Erich Waschneck.