Ub Iwerks Company LP

Ub Iwerks Company LP was an entertainment conglomerate owned by the estate of Ub Iwerks and investors Paul and Lauren Schmidt. In 2014, they sold all of their non-media assets to Laserium Holdings.

History
In 2003, Paul and Lauren Schmidt, with the help of Robert W. Stainton, approached the estate of Ub Iwerks to negotiate about the rights to the Ub Iwerks name and characters. The deal was approved and the company was formed on November 2, 2003, as a partnership between the estate and the Schmidts.

Between 2004 and 2006, they struck deals with and, United American Parks Corporation,  and , to build parks in Incheon, South Korea; Anaheim, California & Orlando, Florida; Moscow, Russia; and Murcia, Spain. They set out with and Salovaara &amp; Kukkonen Group to design the theme parks and resorts.

In 2007, they unveiled plans to build more parks in the Philippines, Uruguay, Argentina, Azerbaijan, Turkey and Macau, after getting approval from respective governments. These parks are still in development at CPN Location-Based and Immersive Entertainment.

For the theme parks' attractions, Ub Iwerks Company founded satellite offices in Riyadh, Tel Aviv, Taipei, Kuala Lumpur, Chennai, Jakarta, Bangkok, Singapore, Shanghai, Hong Kong, Kingston, Johannesburg, Sofia, Tehran, Ulan Bator, Lahore, Reykjavik, Madrid, Prague, Manila City, Athens, Istanbul, Auckland, Glasgow, Bratislava, Lisbon, Rome, Copenhagen, Budapest, Bucharest, Bristol, Surrey, Dublin, Sao Paulo and Amsterdam, hiring "aspiring imagineers" to develop ideas to make each park unique.

In 2008, due to the global recession, Ub Iwerks Company LP was sold to Apollo Global Management and Dubai Holding. Their connections to Dubai Holdings resulted in negotiations of building an Ub Iwerks amusement park in the United Arab Emirates.

In 2010, they struck a deal with and  to create a cruise line operation, named Ub Iwerks Cruises. Ub Iwerks Company also founded the experience days division Ub Iwerks Experience Days, new company Ub Iwerks Underwater Leisures LLC, and the balloon flights operation Ub Iwers Balloon Flights - their main motive was to rival Virgin Group.

They also announced plans for golf clubs in Puetro Rico, opened a chain of casinos called Ub Iwerks Casinos - to appeal to older audiences -, founded the Chuck E Cheese's-like playplace chain Ub Iwers Playplaces - set to open outside North America to better build the brand recognition of Ub Iwerks - and also founded Ub Iwerks Urban Labs, an urban innovation division whose goal was to improve urban infrastructure through technological solutions, and tackle issues such as cost of living, efficient transportation and energy usage. They were to help out with developing some aspects of the planned Ub Iwerks parks further.

Also in 2010, they founded Ub Iwerks Bus Tours, which received licenses in Belgium, Croatia, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Lithuania, Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Romania, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Latvia, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland, and started operations in May in all of the countries.

Post-Laserium acquisition of non-media assets
On July 7, 2017, three years after sale of its non-media properties to Laserium Holdings, the company filed for bankruptcy. Nowadays, all Laserium Playplaces, Laserium Casinos and Laserium Arcades operate under the XPZone brand.

List of former assets

 * Ub Iwerks Theme Parks
 * Ub Iwerks Hollywood and Ub Iwerks Studios Burbank
 * Ub Iwerks Spain (Murcia)