The Swatch Group Ltd is a Swiss manufacturer of watches and jewellery. The company was founded in 1983 by the merger of ASUAG and SSIH to move to manufacturing quartz-crystal watches to resolve the quartz crisis threatening the traditional Swiss watchmaking industry.
Blancpain wristwatch
Breguet No. 1705 tourbillon wristwatch
Panomatic Lunar watch by Glashütte Original
The quartz crisis (Swiss) or quartz revolution was the upheaval in the watchmaking industry caused by the advent of quartz watches in the 1970s and early 1980s, that largely replaced mechanical watches around the world. It caused a significant decline of the Swiss watchmaking industry, which chose to remain focused on traditional mechanical watches, while the majority of the world's watch production shifted to Japanese companies such as Seiko, Citizen and Casio which embraced the new electronic technology.
Quartz movement of the Seiko Astron, 1969
The first Swiss quartz clock, which was made after World War II (left), on display at the International Museum of Horology in La Chaux-de-Fonds
Seiko Grand Quartz, produced in 1978
Swatch Once Again watch