Amos E. Joel Jr., Cellphone Pioneer, Dies at 90

Amos E. Joel Jr., an inventor whose switching device opened the way for the cellular phone business, died Oct. 25 at his home in Maplewood, N.J. He was 90. [via The New York Times]

Mr. Joel received more than 70 patents, but he was perhaps best known for No. 3,663,762, a 1972 patent that allows a cellphone user to make an uninterrupted call while moving from one cell region to another.

“Without his invention, there wouldn’t be all these people walking around with cellphones,” said Frank Vigilante, who was one of Mr. Joel’s supervisor at Bell Labs. “He really allowed that business to form and to be a business.”

emily | 11:36 AM | SMS, a little history |
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