Ralph Bernard

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Ralph Mitchell Bernard CBE (born 11 February 1953) [1] is a British journalist, and a former chief executive of commercial radio group GCap Media.

Contents

Early life

He attended Caterham High School in north-east London.

Career

He started his career as a journalist at Sheffield's Radio Hallam in 1975, [2] before moving to Hereward Radio in Peterborough.

In 1982 he moved south to launch Wiltshire Radio as programme director, becoming managing director in 1983. [2] From here, he helped develop the GWR radio group which later merged with Capital Radio to form the biggest commercial radio company in the UK, GCap Media. He was chief executive of GWR Group PLC between 1987 and 2001, when he was appointed Executive Chairman. [2] GCap Media's portfolio includes Classic FM and London's Capital Radio.

He was appointed a Fellow of The Radio Academy in 1998. [3] , he won the Sony Gold Award in 2000 for his contribution to the radio industry [4] and was appointed a CBE for his services to broadcasting in 2002. [2] He left GCap in March 2008 to be replaced by Fru Hazlitt.

He is chair of the Broadcast Journalism Training Council (BJTC), a partnership between the major broadcasters, the National Union of Journalists (NUJ) and academics who teach broadcast and multimedia journalism. [5]

Personal life

He is married with four children and lives in Wiltshire. [4] He was awarded the CBE in the 2002 Birthday Honours.

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References

  1. Companies House
  2. 1 2 3 4 http://www.mediacsrforum.org/_media/documents/gcap_media_AR_07.pdf [ bare URL PDF ][ dead link ]
  3. The Radio Academy "Fellows" Archived 2014-10-24 at the Wayback Machine
  4. 1 2 "BBC Charter Review Informed Seminars" (PDF). Department for Culture, Media, and Sport. July–December 2004. Archived from the original (PDF) on December 3, 2009.
  5. "BJTC Broadcast Journalism Training Council". Archived from the original on 2016-11-22. Retrieved 2016-11-22.
Business positions
Preceded by
Chairman of Classic FM
2007 - 2012
Succeeded by
Preceded by
Chief Executive of GCap Media
2005 - 2007
Succeeded by
Preceded by
Chief Executive of Classic FM
1997 - 2005
Succeeded by
Preceded by
Executive Chairman of GWR Group
2001 - 2005
Succeeded by
Preceded by
Chief Executive of GWR Group
1985 - 2001
Succeeded by