Jean-Baptiste Soleil Jean-Baptiste Soleil </div>Jean-Baptiste François Soleil (1798–1878) was a French optician and engineer. In 1819, Soleil founded an eponymous company at 23 Passage Vivienne in Paris, specialised in making optics instruments for such notable researchers as Fresnel, Arago, Foucault and Babinet. In 1825 he moved business to 21, rue de l'Odéon . In 1843, he made a heliostat for Jean Thiébault Silbermann. In 1849, the business was split between to divisions under his son Henri Soleil, and his son-in-law Jules Duboscq. The Soleil division went on under Laurent Soleil, and has now been renamed to Jobin Yvon. The Duboscq division was
Portes du Soleil Portes du Soleil Les Portes du Soleil (literally "The Doors of the Sun") is a major skisports destination in the Alps, encompassing thirteen resorts between Mont Blanc in France and Lake Geneva in Switzerland. With more than 650 km of marked pistes (claimed by the lift companies; an independent expert measured about 426 km ) and about 200 lifts in total, spread over 14 valleys and about , Portes du Soleil ranks among the two largest ski areas in the world (the other being Les Trois Vallées). Almost all of the pistes are connected by lifts – a few marginal