Bertrand Hochwald
The Frank M. Freimann Professor of Electrical Engineering
Bert Hochwald has seen the practice of wireless communications from many
different angles in his roles at the Department of Defense, Bell
Laboratories, and Beceem Communications, an integrated circuits design
start-up in California. Along the way, he has invented technologies and
published research articles that are now mainstays of communication theory
and practice today, having won paper awards, numerous patents, and become a
Fellow of the Insitute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers.
At Notre Dame, Hochwald brings his experiences with wireless systems,
devices, and service providers, to a research and teaching program that
analyzes and pushes the design and performance envelope of the
next-generation systems. He believes that wireless communications is,
after its first 100 years, still in its infancy, and if everyone understood
wireless technology a little better, they would all want to design their own smartphone.
The Freimann Professorship in Electrical Engineering holds the distinction of being Notre Dame’s first endowed chair. It was established with earnings from a gift of the Freimann Charitable Trust, made in honor of Frank Freimann, a pioneer of the electronics industry and former chief executive officer of Magnavox. There are now 11 Freimann chairs at Notre Dame, all in engineering and physics.
