Jos. Schneider Optical Works

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Jos. Schneider Optische Werke GmbH
(short form: Schneider-Kreuznach)
legal form GmbH
founding 1913
Seat Bad Kreuznach , Germany
management Wolfgang Ullrich, CEO

Heiko Kober, CFO

Number of employees 550 in total

350 in Germany

Branch Optics, measurement technology, precision mechanics
Website www.schneiderkreuznach.com

Jos. Schneider Optische Werke GmbH (for short: Schneider-Kreuznach ), based in Bad Kreuznach, is a world-wide known optical - precision engineering company.

Founded in 1913 in Bad Kreuznach an der Nahe , the company has been operating officially as Jos since 1922 . Schneider Optische Werke , also known as Schneider-Kreuznach in the logo . The headquarters of the international Schneider Group is in Bad Kreuznach. After bankruptcy in 1982, the Schneider Group is owned by the family of the photo industrialist Heinrich Manderman, who died in 2002 .

After a realignment of the corporate structure, the third area of Precision Engineering was created in addition to the two business areas Film & Photo and Imaging Systems .

Company history

Old Adox Prontor 500 LK with Radionar L 45 f / 2.8 lens from Schneider-Kreuznach

The company began developing and producing camera lenses after it was founded in 1913 by Joseph Schneider . Two years later, the first cinema projection lenses were made. In 1920 the first wide-angle lenses were calculated for the large format . Formative for the globally successful product developments from 1924 to the mid-1940s was his chief designer Albrecht Wilhelm Tronnier , who set up ISCO in (his home town) Göttingen from 1936 .

The first variable focal length lenses were developed in 1957. The precision engineering division has been developing, producing and selling electrohydraulic and electro-pneumatic servo valves with electronic controllers since 1961 . In 1964, Schneider was one of the first producers to introduce zoom lenses for film, photography and television . In 1972 Schneider expanded into the USA with the sales subsidiary Schneider Optics Inc.

The crisis in cine film photography in the early 1980s also had existential significance for Schneider. The company, which has now been converted into a stock corporation and managed by Hans Joseph Schneider , had to file for bankruptcy in 1982 . The new majority shareholder, investor and company manager was the photo entrepreneur Heinrich Manderman. In the course of bankruptcy proceedings, the company archive was transferred to the Koblenz State Main Archive in 1982 .

Spectacle lenses made of silicate glass and plastic have been part of the sales program since 1984 . With the takeover of the B + W filter factory (founded in 1947 by Walter Biermann and Johannes Weber in Berlin) in 1985 and the production of Käsemann polarization elements in glass and plastic, the photo filter division was added. Aspherical large format lenses have been manufactured since 1999, modern cinema projection lenses with iris diaphragms have been on the market since 2003.

The Schneider Group expanded from 1997 through the establishment of subsidiaries Pentacon GmbH Photo and Precision Engineering (part of the former Kombinat VEB Pentacon , Dresden), through the acquisition of Century Precision Optics in the United States , the integration of ISK OPTICS GmbH (formerly ISCO Group Göttingen ) and the establishment of branches in South Korea , Hong Kong and China .

In 1997, for health reasons, Heinrich Manderman completely handed over the management to Peter Weber, whom he had already appointed managing director in 1992. After the death of Heinrich Manderman in 2002, his daughter Ethel Cygler became the main shareholder of Jos. Schneider Optische Werke GmbH. Josef Staub had been the sole managing director since the beginning of 2003 , he retired in November 2015 and was succeeded by Thomas Kessler in April 2016. Wolfgang Ullrich has been managing the Schneider Group as CEO since April 1, 2020.

Schneider Group

In addition to Jos. Schneider Optische Werke GmbH with its headquarters in Bad Kreuznach , Germany, four subsidiaries.

Current activities and products

PC-TS Apo-Digitar 1: 5.6 / 120mm for medium format - Mamiya / Phase One
B + W UV filter

The company's core competencies are:

  • Optical design,
  • Mechanical design,
  • Measurement technology for optical systems (MTF, interferometry, spectrophotometry, etc.),
  • High quality optics production (including aspheric technology ),
  • Precision mechanics,
  • Design and manufacture of thin film systems.

Current fields of activity include:

  • Contactless measurement technology using digital image processing,
  • Image acquisition and processing
  • Digital projection (LCD, DMD)
  • Equipment construction for optical instruments

Schneider-Kreuznach specializes in the development and production of high-performance lenses. The product range includes magnifying lenses, cinema projection lenses for all common formats of analog and digital technology, projectors and lenses for home cinema , lenses for various technical applications, magnifying glasses for visual control, photographic filters (B + W filters) for digital and analog ( Black and white and color film ) photography as well as software filters for digital image processing, optical filters for a wide variety of industrial applications, electro-hydraulic and electro-pneumatic servo valves with electronic controls and single vision, multifocal and progressive lenses. Schneider-Kreuznach is also active in the areas of digital cinema projection, home cinema , e-cinema and simulation . Camera technology and lenses from Schneider-Kreuznach are built into the Blackberry Priv smartphone , which is the first Android- based device from BlackBerry.

Schneider-Kreuznach was also a manufacturer / developer of medium format lenses for Hasselblad (V series), Rollei (6000 series), Alpa (large format lenses with a distance screw), Exakta ( Exakta 66 with P6 bayonet ) and Phase One / Mamiya . In addition, they produced photo lenses for small and large format - lenses including shutters for digital photography . In digital photography, Schneider-Kreuznach cooperated with the camera manufacturers Kodak , Samsung and Phase One / Mamiya . In 2016 Schneider-Kreuznach ended his plans in lens development for MFT cameras in order to concentrate on the market for full-frame sensor cameras in film and photo.

Special events

The NASA continued their space missions " Lunar Orbiter " of the Apollo program from 1959 to 1976 and in the space shuttle flights since 1990 Schneider lenses one. In preparation for the first moon landing , Schneider lenses provided image material for the cartography of the moon .

The company (or its employees) received the Academy Technical Achievement Award in 1976, 1978, 1989, 2000, 2001 and 2006 , which is presented by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences in line with the Oscars.

Movie

  • The viewers from Bad Kreuznach. Jos. Schneider Optical Works in Bad Kreuznach. (Alternative title: Schneider-Optik - Die Durchblicker from Bad Kreuznach .) Documentary, Germany, 2011, 28:55 min., Written and directed: Thomas Niemietz, production: SWR , series: made in rheinland-pfalz , first broadcast: October 12th 2011 on SWR, table of contents and online video from ARD .

Web links

Commons : Schneider-Kreuznach  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b The company. Jos. Schneider Optische Werke GmbH. In: Schneider-Kreuznach , accessed on February 17, 2017.
  2. ↑ a b c Press release: 90 years of Schneider-Kreuznach. From a family business to a versatile, globally active optics company. ( Memento from July 15, 2011 in the Internet Archive ). In: Schneider-Kreuznach , July 2003, (PDF; 4 pp., 533 kB).
  3. ↑ Fabian Pöschl: Schneider-Kreuznach pulls the rip cord. In: CEtoday.ch , July 7, 2015.
  4. ↑ Press release: Dr. Thomas Kessler becomes the new managing director of Schneider-Kreuznach. ( Memento from January 7, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) In: Schneider-Kreuznach , December 10, 2015.
  5. ↑ The Schneider Group. ( Memento from February 6, 2015 in the Internet Archive ) In: Schneider-Kreuznach , 2017, accessed on February 17, 2017.
  6. ↑ PRIV by BlackBerry. In: BlackBerry Bog , October 14, 2015.
  7. ↑ Phase One Lenses. In: phaseone.com , (German), accessed on February 17, 2017.
  8. ↑ Andreas Kesberger: The tailor cut. 103 years are enough - the end of the Schneider-Kreuznach photo division - what happens next with view camera lenses? In: PhotoNews , 2016, No. 3, p. 26.
     Christoph Jehle: Interview: Schneider-Kreuznach on the role of photo optics in the company. In: c't Digitale Fotografie , July 7, 2015.
  9. ^ Employees from Schneider Kreuznach in Los Angeles received the "Technical Achievement Award". ( Memento of October 4, 2012 in the Internet Archive ). In: Schneider-Kreuznach , February 18, 2006.