Henri de France was an influential French television engineer. He was the author of the 819 line standard, the inventor of SECAM and apparently behind the HD-MAC high-definition standard.

On December 6, 1931, he founded the Compagnie Générale de Télévision in Le Havre and develops television sets using a vertical definition of 60 lines.

Another French pioneer of the time is René Barthélemy .

In February 1932, de France makes several transmissions over a distance of 7 kilometers from the Radio-Normandie station in Fécamps . His signals can be received by a few people located at over 100 kilometers away.

In October 1932, he obtains a definition of 120 lines.

In 1956 he patents the SECAM color television system.

On October 1, 1967 at 2:15pm CET, la deuxième chaîne switched broadcast from black and white to color using SECAM.

Died in January 1996. Interred at Jarnac, the same town where former president François Mitterrand lies.

The public passage near France Télévisions buildings in Paris is named Esplanade Henri de France.