Heterobimetallic molecular Cu-Ni and Cu-Co complexes [Cu 2 Ni 4 (acac) 2 (dmae) 2 (dmaeH) 2 (OH)(TFA) 6 ] (1) and [Cu 2 Co 4 (acac) 2 (dmae) 2 (dmaeH) 2 (OH)(TFA) 6 ] (2) [dmae = N,N-dimethylaminoethanol, TFA = trifluoroacetic acid and acac = 2,4-pentanedionate] were prepared and tested as precursors for the deposition of mixed metal oxide composite thin films. The complexes were synthesized by reaction of the tetrameric copper(II) complex [Cu(dmae)(TFA)] 4 with M(acac) 2 ÁxH 2 O [M = Ni, x = 2; Co, x = 1] in THF and were characterized by melting point, elemental analysis, FT-IR spectroscopy, TG/DTG and single-crystal X-ray diffraction. The complexes are isomorphous and crystallize in the triclinic centrosymmetric space group P % 1. Aerosol assisted chemical vapour deposition (AACVD) studies carried out on ( 1) and ( 2) showed that they are promising precursors for the deposition of thin films of crystalline CuO-NiO and Cu 2 O-CoO composites, respectively. The size, shape, surface morphology, microstructure, chemical composition and crystallinity of the resulting mixed-metal oxide composite thin films were analysed by scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and X-ray diffraction (XRD). The analysis proved that the thin films are crystalline, uniform, smooth and tightly adherent to the substrates.