Udo Krell
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Udo Krell is the German inventor of the Professor's Cube, also known as the 5x5x5 Cube.
Udo Krell applied for German patent 3138663 for his puzzle mechanism in September 1981.[2] Several designs for the 5x5x5 were proposed at the time, but it was Krell's design which was first manufactured (by Uwe Mèffert) in Hong Kong in 1983.[3] It was marketed by Ideal Toys in 1983 in Germany as "Rubik's Wahn" (Wahn = delusion or illusion), and it was also sold in Japan.[4] In 1985 Christoph Bandelow bought the unsold German stock;[5] he sold it "under the name "Giant Magic Cube".[6] In the 1990s Meffert reissued the puzzle with the name "Professor's Cube".[7]
Péter Sebestény, the inventor of the 4x4x4 Cube, later remarked that "I didn't know at that time and learned only years later that Mr. Udo Krell, the inventor lived in Hamburg, in the same city as I did. Naturally, Ideal Toy gave me no hint that the 5x5x5 was being developed."