TAG Heuer | The Art of Manufacturing – Chevenez Opening

TAG Heuer is enjoying a 20% spike in growth in a country that no longer produces the quantity of components required by its watch industry. Increased demand, too few components: to counter this two-pronged dilemma, and stay true to its 153 years of proud Swiss heritage, TAG Heuer has invested large amounts of capital and ingenuity into the expansion of its production capacity in Switzerland.

In 2004, the brand opened a Cortech manufacture on a new site in the Jura commune of Cornol. Here, 150 technicians make, by hand and machine, TAG Heuer watch cases in stainless steel, stainless steel and gold, and gold. In 2009, a movement workshop was added, producing main plates and bridges for mechanical movements.

In 2010, TAG Heuer added two movement workshops to its main site at La Chaux de Fonds, one for award-winning “haute horlogerie” mechanical movements like the Mikrograph, Mikrotimer, Yin & Yang, V4, MikrotourbillonS, and the other for its mechanical Chronograph Calibre 1887. Perfected after three years of intense R&D the Calibre 1887 oscillates at 28,800 beats per hour and has 320 working parts, including a column wheel and an audaciously re-engineered version of the brand’s 1887-patented oscillating pinion. At our T1 facility, more than 1,000 calibres are produced each week, or one every two minutes.

In 2011, TAG Heuer acquired ArteCad. Established in Tramelan in 1885, it is one of Switzerland’s top producing and most highly integrated dial manufactures.
In 2012, TAG Heuer began construction of the fourth TAG Heuer Manufacture in Chevenez, in the Swiss Jura. Like the Chaux-de-Fonds manufacture, it will produce the Calibre 1887 and a brand new integrated mechanical chronograph movement, the 100% in-house developed Calibre 1969. The new 2,600 m2 facility will create more than 100 new jobs, bringing the total number of people employed by TAG heuer in Switzerland to about 800.

Total expenditure to date for the Calibre 1887 and Calibre 1969 is over 40 millions Swiss Francs. Production volume of the innovative movements have outpaced expectations: started in 2010, it will surpass 50,000 units in 2013 and reach a projected target capacity of 100,000 by 2016.

In-house manufactured movements, cases and dials: TAG Heuer is one of a very small handful of Swiss manufactures that can boast such comprehensive production capacities. This exceptional level of watchmaking excellence has earned the company membership in the most exclusive circle the Swiss watchmaking elite, the Fondation de la Haute Horlogerie (FHH).