It provided broadcasting and telegraphy services, and sold its equipment throughout the French colonial empire and in many other parts of the world.

[1] In France the engineer captain Gustave-Auguste Ferrié (1868–1932) gathered a team to work on wireless telegraphy for the military.

[5] Ferrié demonstrated the value of radio telegraphy to the government during the volcanic eruption of the Mount Pelée in Martinique, and showed the value of placing antennas at the summit of the Eiffel Tower.

[2] Girardeau and the scientist Joseph Bethenod decided to found a French company to meet military and civilian radio communication needs.

This led to orders for SFR equipment from Belgium, Mexico, Turkey, Bulgaria, Serbia, Italy, Russia and China.

Between 1910 and 1914 the SFR developed musical frequency resonance alternators, established stations in the Belgian Congo and Russia, developed field transmitters that could be carried by car or mule, which were tested in the 1912–13 Balkan Wars, and installed the first transmitters on airships, airplanes, warships, fishing boats and passenger boats.

[8] A new machine providing continuous waves using the Bethenod process was installed at the Lyon la Doua station.

[2] Creation of the Compagnie générale de la télégraphie sans fil (CSF) in 1918 was due to the success of the SFR and the initiative of investors led by the Banque de Paris et des Pays-Bas (BPPB) and including the Compagnie Française des Câbles Télégraphiques (CFCT), which operated transatlantic telegraph lines.

[15] During the inter-war period the German Telefunken, the British Marconi, the American RCA and the French CSF operated as a cartel, avoiding competition.

[16] During meetings of the International Broadcasting Union ostensibly concerned with regulating use of radio frequencies the company leaders made agreements for cross-licensing of patents and for carving up the market.

[2] One of the company's early achievements was construction of the Sainte-Assise long-wave transmission station, near Melun, through its subsidiary Radio-France.

[12] In Sainte Assise the Radio-France subsidiary began broadcasting to Europe, America and the Far East in 1921 under a 30-year state concession signed in 1920.

[13] Additional radio broadcast stations were created in Clichy, Toulouse, Algiers, Ankara, Tunis, Rennes, Lille and Strasbourg.

[18] Although France was not immediately affected by the Great Depression, CSF felt the effect in 1929 since radio transmission was mainly the result of global commercial activity.

Ponte was appointed director of the "lampes" department, the name used for electronic tubes at the time, but continued to be directly involved in research, particularly into magnetrons to generate ultra-short waves for obstacle detection.

[22] CSF did not get involved in television cameras and receivers, but from 1935 was the PTT's main contact for development of TV transmitters.

[14] In the early months of the war the Levallois laboratories made important advances in the development of the cavity magnetron, which paved the way for centimeter radar that will be widely used by the Allies from 1943 to equip hunters and bombers.

[27] In his defense, Brenot said that Telefunken's permanent representative in Paris, Doctor Schultz, was a former composer and virtuoso pianist with whom he had formed cordial relations before the war, and who was liberal, anti-militaristic and anti-Nazi.

[22] The project to develop the Spectro-Lecteur spectrum analysis device was launched at Radio-Cinema in 1947 in response to a request from the metallurgical company Pechiney.

[33] Early in the 1950s Radio-Cinema acquired the company of André Charlin, an engineer known for his expertise in talking movies, loudspeakers and stereophonics.

[34] In 1954 Radio-Cinema became the Compagnie des Applications Mécaniques et Electroniques au Cinéma et à l'Atomistique (CAMECA).

The company retained its core business but diversified into precision engineering, making scientific instrumentation and aerospace radars.

In 1955 CAMECA was structured with three departments, one to produce Radio-Cinema and Charlin film projectors, one undertaking mechanical production for other CSF subsidiaries, and the third working on the Spectro-Lecteur.