Omega
The story of Omega Watches begins in 1848 with a 23 year old Swiss man called Louis Brandt. He assembled his own watches from parts sourced from local craftsmen and sold them across Europe via England. After his death, his sons took over the business but, troubled by unreliable craftsmanship in their components, the brothers made the decision to take all the manufacture in-house and make quality control alot easier. The business therefore moved into a small factory in January 1880 before buying the entire building in December. Two years later the company moved again, this time into a converted spinning-factory, where headquarters remain situated to this today. By the time of the brothers' death in 1903, the company had become Switzerland's largest watch company, producing over 240,000 watches annually and employing 800 people.
The economic difficulties brought on by the First World War led ultimately to the merger between Omega and Tissot in 1930 within the group SSIH, Geneva. By the seventies, SSIH had become Switzerland's number one producer of finished watches and number three in the world.
However, the severe monetary crisis and recession of 1975 to 1980 weakened SSIH to such an extent that they were eventually bailed out by the banks in 1981. During this period, Seiko expressed interest in acquiring Omega, but nothing came out of the talks.
In 1983 Omega merged with another Swiss watch giant, Allgemeine Schweizerische Uhrenindustrie AG (ASUAG), to form what would become the Swatch group.
Some interesting Omega Trivia:
The Omega Speedmaster Professional Chronograph was the first watch on the Moon, worn by "Buzz" Aldrin.
Omega has been associated with James Bond movies since 1995 when Pierce Brosnan took over the role and began wearing the Omega Seamaster Quartz Professional in the movie GoldenEye. In all later films, Bond has worn an Omega Seamaster Professional Chronometer.
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