Our gifted French engineer started his personal audio crusade for innovating better sound in the early 70s. In 1974, he founded the Audience company in partnership with Yves Bernard André, founder of YBA. By 1976, Milot launched the Leedh brand (that means Holophonic Laboratory of Research and Development) with Michel Reverchon of Goldmund. Under Leedh, he released several loudspeakers like the Perspective, Theoreme, Aura, Starlet, Elfe and Ether. This paralleled extensive research into unusual materials like concrete plaster, silicone grease or cochineal extract for fiberglass membrane treatments. From 1989-2006, Milot worked for Harman/France as R&D director of Audax, the famous French loudspeaker manufacturer where he pioneered new membranes and drivers like Aerogel or the HD3P. And he continued to release further speaker designs such as the Leedh Psyche, Nazca and Ica.
But Gilles Milot was not solely focused on transducers. In 1980 he founded Micromega whose goal was to market electronics designed by Leedh. This company he sold to Daniel Schär a few years later. In 1984, Micromega were first to release a CD player in separate transport and converter chassis. The cooperation between Micromega and Leedh lasted until 1988. Having enjoyed numerous discussions with Milot, I think of him as one of the very few who is this deeply and extensively involved with technical audio developments in any number of applications. Perhaps only someone like Nelson Pass spends equal time (which is to say, day and night), to push new developments.
