Washington — Apple co-founder and CEO Steve Jobs topped the list of 2009 inductees to the Consumer Electronics Hall of Fame.
The Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) announced the new Hall of Famers during its Digital Patriots dinner, here, Wednesday night.
The CE Hall of Fame, created in 2000, honors consumer electronics industry leaders who made vital contributions to the products and services that consumers value, CEA said. The CE Hall of Fame includes inventors, executives, engineers, retailers and journalists who are selected by an independent panel of industry judges.
Following are the new members of the Hall of Fame in the categories in which they were inducted:
Sales/Marketing:
Steve Jobs, co-founder and CEO of Apple who helped to create one of the first commercially successful PCs, the Macintosh (Mac); John Shalam, who founded Audiovox and helped establish the aftermarket car audio business, the aftermarket security business and the mobile video business, and has served as CEA chairman; Neil Terk, founder of Terk Technologies, introduced the Pi antenna in 1987. The Pi was selected to be sold through the Museum of Modern Art.
Founders/Inventors:
Dr. Irwin M. Jacobs, co-founder of Qualcomm who led the commercialization of CDMA technology. Karl Hassel and Ralph Mathews were the founders of the Chicago Radio Laboratory, which later became Zenith Radio.
Retailers:
Walt Stinson, president and co-founder of the Denver-based Listen Up audio/video specialty chain and also founded the Professional Audio Video Retailer’s Association (PARA) in 1979, and Norman, Maurice and Philip Cohen, who took their father’s Cambridge tire store in Boston and created discount retail giant Lechmere Sales that specialized in CE products.
Miscellaneous:
Richard E. Wiley, past chairman of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC), who played a pivotal role in the development of HDTV, serving as chairman of the FCC’s advisory committee on Advanced Television Service for nine years, and Dr. Joseph Flaherty, who demonstrated HDTV to the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers in 1981 and also gave demonstrations to FCC and other officials, who established the Advisory Committee on Advanced Television Systems, leading to the ATSC standard.
Journalist:
Aaron Neretin, a consumer electronics journalist who wrote for Merchandising Week.
These leaders will be inducted into the CE Hall of Fame at a special dinner and ceremony during CEA’s Industry Forum to be held in Phoenix, Oct. 18-21. More information about registering for CEA’s Industry Forum and attending the Hall of Fame Dinner are available at www.ce.org.
