Former Zenith Electronics CEO Jerry Pearlman has been inducted into the Consumer Technology Hall of Fame, a nod to his work in the standardization of high-def and for his role as “Founding Father of the Digital HDTV Grand Alliance,” according to the Consumer Technology Association.
Pearlman, 77, served as Zenith’s CEO from 1983-1995, and helped usher in the technologies that would become the base of the digital TV broadcast standard adopted by both the U.S. and South Korea.
Joining Pearlman among this year’s Hall of Fame inductees are former Phillips Labs president Peter Bingham, former Sarnoff Labs president James Carnes, former General Instrument chairman and CEO Donald Rumsfeld, former AT&T Microelectronics president Curt Crawford and MIT professor Dr. Jae Lim.
CTA president and CEO Gary Shapiro said in a statement that Pearlman and the other Grand Alliance leaders “put aside personal and business interests, working together to formulate an ideal broadcast TV standard. And, although Jerry was retired by then, the nation’s 2009 transition to all-digital broadcasting is viewed as a noteworthy postscript to his career and an exclamation point to his industry contributions.”
