Swatch Group

Mid-range dilemma: quartz or mechanical?

INTERVIEW

By Ash Longet and Serge Maillard

September 2019

While volumes for quartz timepieces continue to decrease in the Swiss watch industry, Certina, one of the oldest brands in the mid-range segment, is experiencing higher demand for its mechanical collections. Its latest innovation aims at protecting the mechanical movement from magnetic fields. We met Adrian Bosshard, the CEO of Certina.

Mid-range dilemma: quartz or mechanical?

INTERVIEW

By Ash Longet and Serge Maillard

September 2019

Mid-range dilemma: quartz or mechanical?

While volumes for quartz timepieces continue to decrease in the Swiss watch industry, Certina, one of the oldest brands in the mid-range segment, is experiencing higher demand for its mechanical collections. Its latest innovation aims at protecting the mechanical movement from magnetic fields. We met Adrian Bosshard, the CEO of Certina.

O

ver the long term, is there a future for Swiss-made quartz watches? It’s the moment of truth for them, as we wrote in an analysis, as they seem increasingly “stuck” between luxury mechanical timepieces and affordable smartwatches. Swiss watch brands have been recovering from the 2015 downturn, but the volumes produced are getting lower and lower each year. In three years, the branch has “lost” 4.4 million watches, mostly affordable quartz timepieces. The industry is leaning towards mechanical watches.

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