Gernelle and Truong
<Francois Gernelle.
February 13, 1994, François Gernelle is watching TV and as he listen to the announcer reporting on the 20th anniversary of the micro-computer. He jumps. When he sees his old boss, André Truong shown as the inventor of the first micro-computer.
André Truong as for a long time played on the ambiguity. The boss of R2E, the company that François Gernelle worked for when he created the MICRAL, he takes this opportunity to proclaim that he is the father of the MICRAL.

In November 1998, after more than 4 years of legal procedure (1994-1998) François Gernelle, gets the right to say that he is the inventor of the micro-computer by the “cour d'appel de Versailles”.

Gernelle and Truong met in 1968 at Intertechnique a company specialize in medical and nuclear applications.
Young electronics engineer François Gernelle proposed to Intertechnique to build micro-computers but that didn’t work.
In 1972, he joins Truong who just started R2E, and during a meeting with the people responsible for l'Inra “Institut national de recherche agronomique” who are looking for a cheap way to build a system to calculate the soil evapotranspiration, François Gernelle proposed to build a calculator for half the price.

He created the first micro-computer in the process.

Today François Gernelle as still some bitterness towards Truong. Why did they miss the chance to become rich with this discovery? It’s because one day in 1975, they missed the opportunity to create a fantastic start-up. The MICRAL had some success in France, and Honeywell was interested in buying the MICRAL. In a bar in Los Angeles that faithful day the boss of Honeywell was offering 2 millions for the MICRAL and it’s software Prologue. Truong asked for 4 millions and the boss of Honeywell not very happy left the table. After Bull bought R2E, in 1983, François Gernelle left Truong to create is own company. But it was too late.


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