Bernard Ghillebaert (born 17 January 1952) is a French telecommunications engineer and businessman, and former Chief Executive of Orange UK. He is importantly known for setting the telecommunication standards for text messaging in 1985.

Early life

He was born in

Strasbourg Strasbourg (, , ; german: Straßburg ; gsw, label=Bas Rhin Alsatian, Strossburi , gsw, label=Haut Rhin Alsatian, Strossburig ) is the prefecture and largest city of the Grand Est region of eastern France and the official seat of the Eu ...

, the principal city and capital of the

Alsace Alsace (, ; ; Low Alemannic German/ gsw-FR, Elsàss ; german: Elsass ; la, Alsatia) is a cultural region and a territorial collectivity in eastern France, on the west bank of the upper Rhine next to Germany and Switzerland. In 2020, it had ...

region of eastern France. He went to the École Polytechnique et de Télécom in Paris, and the Centre National d'Études des Télécommunications.

Career

He joined France Télécom in 1976. From 1982 he directed the GSM development and standardisation project for France Télécom. From 1988 he was GSM programme director for France Télécom Mobile.

Text messaging

With the German engineer

Friedhelm Hillebrand Friedhelm Hillebrand is a German engineer who has been influential in setting mobile telecommunications standards. Hillebrand is one of the inventors of the SMS, as he and Frenchman Bernard Ghillebaert created the concept for the service in 1984. ...

, he created the standards for text messaging in 1984, resulting in February 1985 with the

GSM The Global System for Mobile Communications (GSM) is a standard developed by the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) to describe the protocols for second-generation ( 2G) digital cellular networks used by mobile devices such ...

(Groupe Spécial Mobile) standard, also known as Global System for Mobile Communications for the

Short Message Service Short Message/Messaging Service, commonly abbreviated as SMS, is a text messaging service component of most telephone, Internet and mobile device systems. It uses standardized communication protocols that let mobile devices exchange short text ...

(SMS), now known as

text messaging Text messaging, or texting, is the act of composing and sending electronic messages, typically consisting of alphabetic and numeric characters, between two or more users of mobile devices, desktops/laptops, or another type of compatible comput ...

. After the

Integrated Services Digital Network Integrated Services Digital Network (ISDN) is a set of communication standards for simultaneous digital transmission of voice, video, data, and other network services over the digitalised circuits of the public switched telephone network. W ...

(ISDN) standards had been fixed in the late 1970s, there were thoughts about making a public digital mobile communication network.

Mobitex Mobitex is an OSI based open standard, national public access wireless packet-switched data network. Mobitex puts great emphasis on safety and reliability with its use by military, police, firefighters and ambulance services. It was developed in t ...

, a Public Access Mobile Radio network standard had been conceived in 1981, and put into operation in the mid-1980s. The cooperation programme between France and Germany was known as S900 (from the 900Mhz waveband, and was analogue) and was expected to be in operation by 1986. It was decided to create a digital mobile network, GSM, in 1984, and for this to be in operation by the end of the decade. A prototype digital system, DF900, would be in place before GSM was ready. The new GSM system would have a radio paging service. The Europe-wide Eurosignal paging service had been in operation since 1974. Germany introduced its C-Netz analogue mobile phone network in 1985, based on the C450 standard; it had a digital switching system and digital control channels, and could have implemented a short data message system. In a meeting in late October 1984, the French part of the DF900 project submitted a proposal for the ''provision of an enhanced paging service, with diffusion of alphanumeric messages to mobile users with acknowledgment capabilities''. The messaging system would be two-way, unlike paging systems. On 12 November 1984 at a meeting in London, this proposal became simply ''the transmission of short alphanumeric messages with acknowledgement capabilities''.

Orange

He was the Chief Executive of

Mobistar Orange Belgium (known as Orange) is a Belgian telecommunications company. It competes with Proximus and Base. It was incorporated by France Télécom in 1996 under the name of Mobistar. The company re-branded as Orange on 9 May 2016 (following ...

from 1995, a Belgian mobile phone network. In November 2004 he became the Chief Executive of Orange UK, staying until November 2008.

Personal life

He is married with three sons

References

External links

GSM History

Telecommunications history
{{DEFAULTSORT:Ghillebaert, Bernard 1952 births French chief executives French telecommunications engineers Orange S.A. Engineers from Strasbourg Text messaging Living people Businesspeople from Strasbourg