At ARRI Home throughout NAB 2026, simply 5 days after signing the deal, new ARRI proprietor Thomas Riedel sat down with CineD for an unique video interview alongside ARRI Managing Administrators Chris Richter and David Bermbach. Watch the total dialog above, masking the business response, Eurovision in Vienna, the HONOR partnership, ARRI Rental, training, and what ARRI would possibly appear to be in 2031.

The contract was signed lastMonday evening after what Thomas Riedel described as a really lengthy notary session. By the point he arrived in Las Vegas for NAB 2026, the ink on the paperwork was barely dry, and but the announcement of the Riedel acquisition of ARRI had already set off a wave of reactions throughout the business. The mixture of an unusually clear possession construction (a sole proprietor shopping for together with his personal capital), a shared German heritage, and a said plan to maintain ARRI working independently has answered most of the anxieties that adopted months of sale hypothesis.

The ink remains to be moist

5 days in, Thomas Riedel remains to be processing the dimensions of what he has carried out. “The reactions have been overwhelming,” he instructed us, noting messages from individuals he had not spoken to in years. What struck him most, he mentioned, was that the response was uniformly optimistic, whether or not it got here from inside ARRI, inside Riedel, or from the skin world.

That issues, as a result of the previous yr had been something however reassuring for ARRI. The corporate offered its Claypaky stage lighting subsidiary to EK Inc. after which reduce 150 jobs whereas closing two German services. The Bloomberg report confirming that the Stahl household was exploring a sale had triggered a protracted record of potential consumers within the rumor mill, however Riedel’s title by no means got here up. He mentioned he preferred the truth that nobody actually knew. A number of cooperation initiatives between the 2 corporations had been quietly operating in parallel, which on reflection appears just like the groundwork for precisely this consequence.

A circle closing again to Lillehammer

Riedel’s connection to ARRI goes additional again than most individuals notice. As a 15-year-old hobbyist, he used ARRI theater spotlights as loaners: too costly to personal, however already admired. The origin story he normally tells about his personal firm facilities on the 1994 Olympic Video games in Lillehammer, the place Riedel Communications discovered its breakthrough after serving to out ARRI within the final second, when ARRI wasn’t ready for the intercom necessities of the opening ceremony, for which they equipped the lighting. What he not often mentions is that ARRI was the one to tug him into that mission. His job in Lillehammer immediately led to Riedel’s entry into System 1, so he looks like he can attribute a lot of his success again to ARRI, many years earlier than buying them.

That’s one thing which now closes a circle,” Thomas Riedel mentioned, “and that’s so good actually, virtually emotional for me. – Thomas Riedel

That private historical past, mixed with practically 4 many years of operating Riedel, is a part of why the acquisition was structured the way in which it was. Thomas is 58, the deal is 100% his personal capital, and he has publicly mentioned on the OMR Podcast (in German) that he would by no means promote Riedel as a result of he doesn’t know anybody who mentioned promoting was a good suggestion. When requested what he discovered from the Stahl household, which had simply made the alternative choice, he declined to touch upon their reasoning. His personal place was clear: he isn’t shopping for ARRI to flip it. “I’m right here for a really very long time,” he mentioned, including that his primary concern is just his personal age and the way lengthy he can keep match sufficient to drive this ahead.

Cinema stays top-end, however the subsequent technology issues

The query cinematographers have been asking most loudly because the deal was introduced is whether or not ARRI’s cinema enterprise excites the brand new proprietor as a lot as the published and stay aspect does. Thomas Riedel mentioned individuals mustn’t fear. Riedel already has merchandise, such because the Bolero wi-fi intercom, operating on high-level productions, even Hollywood units. ARRI will proceed to be a prime participant in cinema. The addition of stay and broadcast is, in his framing, complementary fairly than aggressive.

David Bermbach, ARRI Managing Director, was express about the place the cinema enterprise sits within the new setup. The highest finish is house, however it is usually the long run, as a result of there’ll at all times be a marketplace for the perfect picture, the perfect cameras, and the perfect methods on the earth. On the similar time, the business is altering. Younger filmmakers don’t begin with 16mm; they begin with their telephones, then transfer to extra prosumer instruments, then into skilled gear. ARRI’s reply to that is partnerships fairly than a sub-€10K ARRI cinema digicam. The just lately introduced ARRI and HONOR collaboration, which is able to first seem within the HONOR ROBOT PHONE, is the clearest instance. Bermbach described it not as badge-selling however as a mutual technical and strategic collaboration constructed round picture, workflow, consumer expertise, and AI.

Somebody positively must do the highest finish anyway. Despite the fact that the portions is likely to be small, somebody wants to do this. And on this discipline, we imagine it’s us. That doesn’t imply we aren’t happening as nicely. – Thomas Riedel

Chris Richter, additionally Managing Director of ARRI, added that capturing rising filmmakers early, bringing them into the ARRI ecosystem, and making certain ARRI picture high quality is accessible at extra accessible worth factors is essential. Ensuring that the picture, the picture processing, and the standard that ARRI stands for attain that viewers is the work forward. He confirmed there are thrilling initiatives within the pipeline, although none the workforce might focus on but.

What end-to-end options imply for the DP on set

Thomas Riedel has lengthy argued that the long run is about end-to-end options fairly than particular person merchandise. For a DP on an ALEXA 35 set, that would translate into wirelessly linked units, shared knowledge, video, and management throughout the crew, and shot footage already obtainable to producers who are usually not bodily on location. Riedel’s RF experience will circulate into ARRI as know-how constructing blocks.

David Bermbach picked up the identical thread from the DP’s creative-control angle. As studios push towards larger effectivity and extra industrialized workflows, networking and communication have turn into the most important hassle factors on set. Reliability drops, complexity rises, and the artistic individuals spend extra time managing the know-how than the story. The ARRI method, he mentioned, is to construct a bubble of know-how across the creatives so they don’t have to fret about it, extending all the way in which to cloud-based workflows for sooner turnaround. ARRI’s current instruments already trace at this route: the ARRI Digicam Companion App for distant management, the ARRI Movie Lab plugin for analog movie emulation in DaVinci Resolve, Baselight, and Nuke, and upcoming Unreal Engine instruments for digital-twin productions.

Rental and companies: totally different philosophies, shared alternative

Each corporations run vital service arms alongside their manufacturing companies, however they arrive at it from reverse instructions. ARRI Rental operates one of many largest cinema rental networks on the earth. Riedel’s Managed Know-how division serves shoppers like System 1 and SailGP, the place both the dimensions or the complexity is past what a traditional rental supplier can do. Crucially, Riedel’s philosophy is to not compete with rental-company shoppers who purchase Riedel gear.

Requested whether or not this pondering would possibly change something on the ARRI aspect, Thomas mentioned the trustworthy reply is that he doesn’t know but. However he sees alternative in it, and he isn’t a powerful believer within the mannequin of promoting gear to rental homes whereas additionally competing with them at rental.

ALEXA 35 Dwell cameras at Eurovision 2026 in Vienna

Maybe essentially the most seen showcase of the Riedel-ARRI mixture is already in build-up: this yr’s Eurovision Track Contest in Vienna. CineD is the official behind-the-scenes companion of ARRI for Eurovision (you’ll see extra movies on that quickly!), and cameras are already being rigged in Munich and Vienna. Thomas Riedel confirmed he was the one who initiated getting ARRI cameras into the manufacturing. He had been speaking to the Austrian state broadcaster ORF, a long-standing Riedel shopper, and pitched the thought of bringing a cinematic look to what he known as the most important music TV present on the earth. ORF agreed, and the take care of ARRI adopted.

Thomas mentioned there will likely be 26 ARRI ALEXA cameras within the stay surroundings, alongside Riedel infrastructure. NEP, the published manufacturing firm chargeable for Eurovision’s vans, instructed the CineD workforce through the first capturing days of the behind-the-scenes documentary that integrating the ARRI ALEXA 35 Dwell multicam system into the published workflow was no totally different than integrating commonplace broadcast cameras. Issues about complexity had evaporated as soon as the engineering work was carried out. For Thomas Riedel, that is successfully the proper showcase for the imaginative and prescient he’s promoting: one set of merchandise, one mixed infrastructure, one stay manufacturing that thousands and thousands will watch.

Schooling and the long-term pipeline

Schooling got here up as one of many areas the place the brand new possession would possibly speed up fairly than change course. The ARRI Academy has skilled generations of cinematographers, and its licensed on-line programs are hosted completely on MZed, CineD’s sister training platform. Thomas Riedel mentioned he’s very dedicated to training basically and open to persevering with and increasing the ARRI Schooling Program. David Bermbach framed training as social accountability, noting {that a} wholesome, self-reinventing business is the idea for every thing ARRI does commercially.

The place will ARRI be in 2031?

Requested the place ARRI will likely be in 5 years, all three leaders answered barely otherwise however arrived on the similar image. {Hardware} will nonetheless exist, however extra of ARRI’s worth will come from software program, companies, and integrating applied sciences. The {hardware} digicam, as David Bermbach put it, might turn into extra of an entry level into an ecosystem for producing content material, one which works hand in hand with just about produced content material, AI instruments, and every thing that’s generated on computer systems. LUKA for Unreal Engine, the ARRI Movie Lab software program, and the licensing relationship with HONOR are the seen first steps into that extra hybrid universe.

Chris Richter added a promise that can curiosity a whole lot of readers: ARRI intends to claw again extra of its lighting enterprise, with thrilling new lighting merchandise coming this yr. Excessive-end movement image cameras stay what he known as the DNA of the corporate. Workflows, nevertheless, are the place the true effectivity positive aspects of the following 5 years will likely be received. Excessive dynamic vary, he famous, is just not solely an aesthetic device however a production-speed device, related additionally notably in stay situations the place lighting circumstances can’t be managed always like on a movie set.

I see us clawing again a few of our lighting enterprise. There’s going to be thrilling new lighting merchandise popping out this yr. – Chris Richter, ARRI

Thomas Riedel closed with what sounded virtually like a request: watch the journey, ask in between, and if the mixed Riedel-ARRI entity loses observe, assist get it again on the right track. For an business that has spent the previous couple of years watching RED absorbed into Nikon, Leica’s future floated as a billion-euro query, and ARRI’s personal mum or dad navigate a tough restructuring, a single proprietor publicly inviting scrutiny is its personal type of assertion.

Does the Riedel period for ARRI encourage optimism, or do you see dangers we’ve got not mentioned? Tell us within the feedback beneath!