Abraham-Louis Breguet, born in Neuchâtel, then a Prussian principality, was a horologist who made many innovations in the course of a career in watchmaking industry, including the tourbillon. He was the founder of the Breguet company, which is now the luxury watch division of the Swiss Swatch Group.
Patek Philippe SA is a Swiss luxury watch and clock manufacturer, located in the Canton of Geneva and the Vallée de Joux. Established in 1839, it is named after two of its founders, Antoni Patek and Adrien Philippe. Since 1932, the company has been owned by the Stern family in Switzerland and remains the last family-owned independent watch manufacturer in Geneva. Patek Philippe is one of the oldest watch manufacturers in the world with an uninterrupted watchmaking history since its founding. It designs and manufactures timepieces as well as movements, including some of the most complicated mechanical watches. The company maintains over 400 retail locations globally and over a dozen distribution centers across Asia, Europe, North America, and Oceania. In 2001, it opened the Patek Philippe Museum in Geneva.
Vacheron Constantin SA is a Swiss luxury watch and clock manufacturer founded in 1755. Since 1996, it has been a subsidiary of the Swiss Richemont Group. Vacheron Constantin is one of the oldest watch manufacturers in the world with an uninterrupted watchmaking history since its foundation in 1755. It employs around 1,200 people worldwide as of 2018, most of whom are based in the company's manufacturing plants in the Canton of Geneva and Vallée de Joux in Switzerland.
In horology, a tourbillon is an addition to the mechanics of a watch escapement to increase accuracy. Conceived by the British watchmaker and inventor John Arnold, it was developed by his friend the Swiss-French watchmaker Abraham-Louis Breguet and patented by Breguet on 26 June 1801. In a tourbillon the escapement and balance wheel are mounted in a rotating cage, with the goal of eliminating errors of poise in the balance giving a uniform weight.
In horology, a complication is any feature of a timepiece beyond the display of hours, minutes and seconds. A timepiece indicating only hours, minutes and seconds is known as a simple movement. Common complications include date or day-of-the-week indicators, alarms, chronographs (stopwatches), and automatic winding mechanisms. Complications may be found in any clock, but they are most notable in mechanical watches where the small size makes them difficult to design and assemble. A typical date-display chronograph may have up to 250 parts, while a particularly complex watch may have a thousand or more parts. Watches with several complications are referred to as grandes complications.
Breguet is a Swiss luxury watch, clock and jewelry manufacturer founded by Abraham-Louis Breguet in Paris in 1775. Headquartered in L'Abbaye, Switzerland, Breguet is one of the oldest surviving watchmaking brands and a pioneer of numerous watchmaking technologies such as the tourbillon, which was developed into a practical solution by Abraham Breguet in 1801. Abraham Breguet also invented and produced the world's first self-winding watch in 1780, as well as the world's first wristwatch in 1810.
Franck Muller is a Swiss luxury watch manufacturer named after its founder. The company's estimated total sales were €290 million in watches with an average unit price of €38,000. Franck Muller's watches are worn by various celebrities, among them Arnold Schwarzenegger, Elton John, Cristiano Ronaldo, David Beckham, Kanye West, Conor McGregor, Floyd Mayweather, Paris Hilton, and Chris Brown.
F. P. Journe, legally Montres Journe SA, is a Swiss high-end watch Manufacture d'horlogerie founded in 1999, June 27th by François-Paul Journe. The only three-time winner of the Aiguille d'Or grand prize from the Fondation du Grand Prix d'Horlogerie de Genève, Journe focuses on complex precision chronometers with a production of around 800 watches per year. 20% of the company was acquired by Chanel in 2018 for an undisclosed amount.
Manufacture Jaeger-LeCoultre SA, or simply Jaeger-LeCoultre, is a Swiss luxury watch and clock manufacturer founded by Antoine LeCoultre in 1833 and is based in Le Sentier, Switzerland. Since 2000, the company has been a fully owned subsidiary of the Swiss luxury group Richemont.
Greubel Forsey is a Swiss watchmaking company specializing in complicated, high-end timepieces. It was launched in 2004 by Robert Greubel and Stephen Forsey and is based in La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland.
Maîtres du Temps is a Swiss watch company. Founded in 2005 by Steven Holtzman, the brand is based in La Chaux-de-Fonds, Switzerland. The brand launched in Geneva in 2008 with Chapter One, a watch developed by Christophe Claret, Roger Dubuis and Peter Speake-Marin.
Léon Louis Gallet (1832–1899), watchmaker, entrepreneur, philanthropist, and past family patriarch of the Gallet Watch Company of Switzerland, is considered as one of the primary architects and founders of the 19th century industrialization of the Swiss watchmaking industry.
Abraham-Louis Perrelet was a Swiss horologist. He was born in Neuchâtel, then in the Principality of Neuchâtel.
Dominique Loiseau was a French and Swiss watchmaker who worked at the highest levels of complex horology from the mid 1970s onwards He was the creator of several notable timepieces, including six Montres de Sables, the Rose de Temps clock, the Renaissance or Capriccio pocket watches and the Blancpain 1735 wristwatch. In 2011 he presented, the Loiseau 1f4, one of the most complicated automatic watches with eight patents. Loiseau announced in 2012 a collaboration with Swiss watch manufacturer Girard-Perregaux.
The Académie Horlogère des Créateurs Indépendants is a non-profit association, founded in 1985 by Svend Andersen and Vincent Calabrese under Swiss civil law. Its mission was to perpetuate the art of independent watch- and clock-making. The AHCI is based in Zürich.
MB&F is a Swiss luxury watch and clock manufacturer founded by Maximilian Busser in July 2005 in Geneva, Switzerland. MB&F specializes in small series of concept-type watches. MB&F's clocks have a futuristic style, and the company has collaborated with other artists and watchmakers.
Masahiro Kikuno is a Japanese watchmaker and youngest member of Académie Horlogère des Créateurs Indépendants.
Philippe Dufour, AHCI is a Swiss-born watchmaker from Le Sentier, Vallée de Joux. He is regarded as a master of modern watchmaking, and his watches are referred as among the best ever made. He finishes all of his watches himself by hand. In 1992, Dufour was the first watchmaker to put arguably the most complex of complications in a wristwatch, a Sonnerie. His other two models include Duality and Simplicity.
A computus clock is a clock equipped with a mechanism that automatically calculates and displays, or helps determine, the date of Easter. A computus watch carries out the same function.
