Ruediger "Barry" Baeres,the founder of beleaguered German licence trader/producer Intertainment,has stepped down from his position as chairman of the company's supervisoryboard "for personal reasons" "with immediate effect."

Baeres founded Intertainmentin 1993 and took the company to the Neuer Markt stock exchange in 1999 as the Chairman of the Boardof Management.

Baeres also partnered with ElieSamaha and Franchise Pictures, committing his companyto financing a slate of films.

In 2004, Samaha andFranchise Pictures were found guilty of getting Baeresto pay grossly inflated budgets on this slate by a US federal court.The knock-on effect for Intertainmentin January 2006 was that it too filed for insolvency after this legal battle.