Орис: Швейцариялық механикалық сағаттар өндірушісінің тарихы

Swiss manufacturer of mechanical watches

Oris SA is a Swiss luxury manufacturer of mechanical watches. The company was founded in 1904 and is based in Hölstein in the canton of Basel Landschaft.

Oris was founded by Paul Cattin and Georges Christian in the Swiss town of Hölstein. They bought the recently closed Lohner & Co watch factory, and on 1 June 1904 the two men entered into a contract with the local mayor. They named their new watch company Oris after a nearby brook, and they began the industrial manufacture of pocket watches. In its founding year, Oris employed 67 people. In 1906, the firm opened an assembly plant and second factory in the nearby town of Holderbank. Another factory followed in Como in 1908. By 1911, Oris had become the largest employer in Hölstein, with over 300 workers. Once all plants were operating at capacity, Oris boasted it could create “one watch every three seconds.”

In 1927, company co founder Georges Christian died and Jacques David LeCoultre became President of the Board of Directors. Jacques David LeCoultre was Antoine LeCoultre’s grandson and the man who merged with Edmond Jaeger to form Jaeger LeCoultre in 1937. Following the death of Georges Christian a year earlier, Oscar Herzog, Christian's brother in law, took over as General Manager in 1928, a position he held for 43 years.

On 12 March 1934 the Swiss government introduced a law known as the Watch Statute, which was intended to protect and regulate the Swiss watch industry. The law authorized a “cartel”, made up of 2,241 designated member companies, 79% of which could have no more than 20 employees. At the time, Oris employed hundreds of people, making it too large to join the official cartel of Swiss manufacturers. The law prevented the large watch companies from introducing new technologies without permission. For Oris, the statute proved to be an obstacle because until that point, Oris had been using pin lever escapement (Roskopf escapement) movements, which were claimed to be less accurate than the lever escapements used by some of Oris’s competitors. Despite continuing commercial success with pin lever escapments, Oris took action against the Watch Statute, in order to enable the company to adopt the more accurate and durable lever escapement. Oris was then allowed to make Swiss lever escapement watches, its first being the automatic Calibre 645, followed shortly by the Calibre 652 movement, which was awarded full chronometer certification, the highest distinction for accuracy, by the Observatoire Astronomique et Chronométrique. By that time, the company produced almost every element of its watch and clock products in house. During the Second World War, Oris’s distribution network beyond Switzerland was reduced significantly, due to decreased consumer demand as well as export and production limitations imposed by the government. To keep business alive, the company started manufacturing alarm clocks. The original diver was recreated in 2015 with the Divers Sixty Five, a vintage inspired collection of dive watches.

By the end of the 1960s, 44 per cent of all watches sold worldwide originated in Switzerland. Oris employed 800 people across a network of factories in Hölstein and beyond, and produced 1.2 million watches and clocks a year, making it one of the 10 largest watch companies in the world. The company developed its own tools and machinery, and even ran an apprenticeship scheme, training 40 engineers and watchmakers every year. The first Swiss quartz analog watch – the Ebauches SA Beta 21 – arrived at the 1970 Basel Fair. The Beta 21 was released by numerous manufacturers including the Omega Electroquartz. On 6 May 1970, Hamilton introduced the Pulsar – the world's first electronic digital watch. In the 1970s and early 1980s, quartz watches from Asia gained massive market share. The so called ‘Quartz Crisis’ meant the end for around 900 watch companies in Switzerland and unemployment for two thirds of watch industry employees. Swiss manufacturers’ market share fell to 13 per cent worldwide. In 1970, Oris gave up its independence and became part of Allgemeine Schweizer Uhrenindustrie AG (ASUAG), the predecessor of the Swatch Group. The management of the parent organization compelled Oris to manufacture quartz watches, in order to compete with the Japanese.

Like many other Swiss watch manufacturers in the early 1980s, Oris was on the verge of closure. Managing Director Dr Rolf Portmann – who was instrumental in the reversal of the Watch Statute – and Head of Marketing Ulrich W. Herzog took over the remainder of the company in 1982 as part of a management buyout. Soon after, the newly formed and independent Oris SA elected to abandon quartz and produce mechanical timepieces in the mid price segment. In 1988, Oris introduced an alarm wristwatch, with the calibre 418, incorporating its own alarm module using a real gong. The movements of these bespoke watches are mainly quartz, made in Switzerland. The brand remains one of the very few Swiss watch manufacturers independent from large groups such as Swatch, Richemont or LVMH.

Since the turn of the millennium, the company has concentrated on watch market sectors of Diving, Culture, Aviation and Motor Sports. Diving: In 2004, the Quick Lock Crown system was developed, which only requires a single clockwise turn of 120 degrees to secure the crown in place. In 2009, Oris introduced the Rotation Safety System, a device that locks the uni directional rotating bezel of a diving watch into place, preventing accidental adjustment underwater. Oris patented the Oris Aquis Depth Gauge, its first mechanical depth gauge, in 2013. It allows water into a channel via a small hole at 12 o’clock. Water enters the hole under pressure, creating a watermark that corresponds to a depth gauge. As of the early 2020's, the brand's flagship product remains the Aquis diver watch line, featuring the in house Calibre 400 and the Quick Strap Change System, which allows the strap to be changed easily and without tools. Culture: The Artelier Worldtimer (2004) was part of the brand’s “Oris Centennial Set”, released to celebrate its 100th anniversary. The Artelier Worldtimier, in contrast, uses a pivoting 2 way bezel that enables the wearer to jump the local hour hand forward or backward in single hour increments while also driving the date. Motor Sports: Although the "Motor Sport Collection" was inaugurated in 1970 with the Chronoris model, focus sharpened through a partnership with Formula One team Williams Racing in 2003, resulting in the 2015 release of the "Williams" featuring stainless steel or black Carbon Fiber and Titanium cases, a sporty, black rubber band, dark face, and blue team colored accents. In 2018 Oris ceased its F1 sponsorship because the watch company's focus shifted to environmental conservation. Since 2002, the Red Rotor has served as Oris's registered trademark and distinguishing feature and is visible on many Oris watches through transparent casebacks. In 2005, Oris sponsored a civic event in Hölstein which featured a smiling bear. This "Oris Bear" subsequently became the company's mascot. In 2014, Oris celebrated 110 years of watchmaking with its first in house developed calibre for 35 years. Calibre 110 was a hand wound movement that featured a 10 day power reserve and a patented non linear power reserve indicator. It featured an exceptionally large barrel spring with a 6 foot (1.8m) spring. It resulted from a collaboration between Oris and L’École Téchnique Le Locle that took over 10 years to realize. In 2020, Oris introduced the Calibre 400, an in house movement which is anti magnetic up to 2250 gauss, has a 5 day power reserve (120 hours), a recommended 10 year service interval and comes with a 10 year warranty. Since 2014, Oris developed its in house Movement Creation Program, which has, over the succeeding decade, unveiled ten new mechanical calibers, the latest of which (as of 2023) is the hand wound caliber 473 with five days of power reserve, increased anti magnetism and a 10 year warranty. In 2022, Oris was named the Official Timekeeper for Lord’s Cricket Ground, the first in the history of the 230 year old cricket club.