Peter Herrmann, producer of Caroline Link's Oscar-winning Nowhere In Africa has left MTM Medien & Television Muenchen to set up his own production outfit.

The new company Peter Herrmann Filmproduktion (PHF), which plans to focus on producing German films with international financing, already has two projects in development.

Herrmann acquired the film rights to Waris Dirie's best-selling autobiography Desert Flower which will be adapted and directed by Sherry Hormann (Lattenknaller).

Somalian-born Dirie was circumcised at five and fled an arranged marriage at 12 to become a supermodel in London and is now an ambassador for the United Nations.

PHF's second project - Tanja - La Guerrillera - is based on the life of the young East German Tamara Bunke who went to Cuba at the beginning of the 1960s to be trained in undercover activities by the Cuban secret service. Tobias Stille is writing the screenplay.

Herrmann founded MTM with producers Gloria Burkert and Andreas Bareiss in 1994 and was also the managing director of MTM West Television und Film. Apart from Nowhere In Africa, he produced Nina Grosse's Olgas Sommer, Roland Suso Richter's Ein Hans voll Gras, Jan Schuette's Fette Welt and Romuald Karmakar's Der Totmacher.