Boards of directors :
| Chairman
and Delegate of the Board of Directors of the Swatch Group: |
Nicolas G. Hayek |
 |
|
| Chief
Executive Officer of the Swatch Group and Delegate of the Board of Directors of Swatch SA: |
George N. Hayek Jr. |
The Swiss watch industry has started in the middle of the 16th century in Geneva. In those days, not only big tower clocks, table clocks and wall clocks to be used at home but also portable watches were already produced in Europe, mainly in northern part of Italy, southern part of Germany and France. In the 17th century, the watchmaking in those area gradually weakened, and at the beginning of the 18th century, Geneva became one of important centers of watchmaking.
Structure of the Swiss Watch Industry :
The Swiss watch industry has had a specialized horizontal structure in which producers of movements and producers external parts supply their products to assemblers, called "etablisseurs", who put them together and make complete watches and clocks. However, to a lesser extent, the industry has also developed a vertically integrated structure in which watches and clocks are sometimes made entirely A to Z by the same company, in this case they are called "manufacture".
During the 1970s and early 1980s, appearance of quartz technology and the difficult economic situation resulted in a reduction in the size of the industry : the number of employees fell from 90,000 in 1970 to 32,000 in 1985, The number of companies decreased from about 1600 in 1970 to 570 in 1990.
|
Year
|
Companies
|
Employees
|
|
1970
|
1620
|
89,500
|
|
1980
|
860
|
47,000
|
|
1985
|
630
|
32,000
|
|
1990
|
570
|
34,000
|
|
1995
|
600
|
33,000
|
|
1999
|
600
|
35,000
|
The average number of employees per company has remained constant, at just under 60 people per company in 1999, as in 1970. In spite of the massive reduction in the number of companies and employees, the structural parameters of the industry have remained practically unchanged. The traditional structure has been maintained but on a reduced scale.
The great majority of watch companies in Switzerland are small sized, employing less than 100 people, while a very little number (less than 10) are each employing over 500 people.
Watch manufacturers are mostly sited in Jura, which is the mountain range lying from the West along the border between France.