And the Global Watch Industry

Switzerland was a pioneer in watches very early on it self. Its biggest watch company, Swatch, dominated the industry at one time. However as foreign competition increased from other nations Swatch was greatly affected. American and European watch makers established assembly plants in the city to take advantage of highly skilled, cheap labor and favorable tax conditions. Globally people started preferring the low end daily use watches from other companies as Timex and Citizen and moved away from the high end and considerably expensive Swatch watches.

Swiss preferred tradition and was reluctant to change. Their industry structure was very fragmented and therefore not adapted to high-volume mass production procedures. As a result, exports of watches fell as well as the employment and the number of firms. All because of the inability of the Swiss to adapt to the rapid emergence of new watch technologies. In order to get back to a good state, the production costs had to be reduced to the Asian's levels.

To survive this problem of old fashioned and expensive watches they had to come out with watches with electronic gadgetries. Creating a new global concept of time also helped revamping the industry. They also came up with a massive advertising campaign to reinforce its message. Swatch has to make it