Ralph Bernard CBE
Pro-Chancellor, distinguished friends, colleagues, graduands and guests.
Ralph Bernard is one of commercial radio’s most senior figures and a driving force behind the transition to digital radio. During a hugely influential career, Ralph Bernard has done much to shape and define the radio industry in this country.
Ralph was born in 1953 and educated at Caterham High School. As a school-boy journalist his first article for the school magazine was rejected, not to be deterred he set up his own publication. After leaving school he found work as a journalist on local newspapers, eventually getting a job in the newsroom of Radio Hallam in Sheffield in 1975.
His break as a journalist came with an award-winning dramatized documentary series, called Drying Out. This led to a job as Head of News at Hereward Radio and later to the position Programme Controller at Wiltshire Radio in 1982. Shortly after joining Wiltshire Radio he became managing director and, in 1985, foreseeing the benefits of consolidation within the industry, he merged the station with Radio West to form GWR. He had the vision to see that merging small radio stations would create bigger audiences and attract more advertising revenue, sustaining the independent sector as a whole.
In the early 1990s Ralph was appointed pre-launch manager for a new commercial music station, Classic FM. This was a venture that few thought would be a success when it was created in 1992. However, after merging the company with GWR, he transformed Classic FM from a business with pre-tax losses into a multi-million pound profit-making organization with millions of loyal listeners. In 2005, he helped arrange the merger of GWR and Capital Radio to create GCap Media, which he led as chief executive until 2007.
As well as being a passionate defender of British commercial radio, Ralph Bernard has also been a strong advocate of digital radio. From as early as 1998 he has seen digital radio as the future for the industry, and he has personally driven this vision forward within his businesses and as chairperson of the Digital Radio Development Bureau.
He was appointed as a Fellow of The Radio Academy in 1998; won the Sony Gold Award for services to the radio industry in 2000; and received a CBE for his services to broadcasting in 2002.
In addition to his work in the radio industry, Ralph has had periods as Chairman of the Central School of Ballet, Chairman of the British Lung Foundation and chief executive of the Royal Albert Hall.
In recognition of his outstanding contribution to the radio industry and broadcasting, Coventry University, by decision of the Academic Board, has the privilege of conferring the Degree of Doctor of Technology, honoris causa, on Ralph Bernard.