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Audemars Piguet
from: Wikipedia
Audemars Piguet is a manufacturer of expensive Swiss watches that compete with Patek Phillipe and Vacheron Constantin.
Contents
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Foundation
The roots of Audemars Piguet date back to 1875, when the 23-year-old
Jules-Louis Audemars met Edward-Auguste Piguet, then only 21, at Vallée
de Joux, which is considered[who?]
to be the cradle of prestige watch-making. Their hometown was Le
Brassus. When they graduated school they went to Vallée de Joux to
start working in their favorite field of watch manufacturing.
Thus Audemars started producing component parts for movements and Piguet got the job of a repasseur, whose job it was to make the final regulation of the timepiece. They founded a firm later known as Audemars, Piguet et Cie.
Since 1882, members of the Audemars and Piguet families have always
been on the board of directors and have thus directly or indirectly run
the company.
Business
The business started with Audemars managing the production and
technical part and Piguet focusing on sales, and success was not
immediate. The Audemars Piguet trademark was registered in 1882,
however it would be seven years later that the company was officially
founded. At this point Audemars Piguet et Cie became one of the largest
employers for watch-making in the whole of Vaud, southwestern
Switzerland.
The company opened its first branch in Geneva in 1889, and began
creating its own components and assembling within its factory with
direct supervision and strict quality control .
Between 1894 and 1899 the company produced about 1,200 timepieces,
including some very complex watches. When Audemars and Piguet died, in
1918 and 1919 respectively, the company steadily grew and became more
famous. As the success of the company's business was rising its
customers became Tiffany & Co, Cartier and Bulgari, who rebranded
and sold Audemars Piguet watches under their own house names. Today
these watches are only identifiable as Audemars Piguet products by
their serial numbers.
Later Audemars Piguet launched several watches like the smallest
minute repeater in the world and a jumping second hand (i.e. the second
hand jumps from second to second in quanta rather than progressively)
pocket watch. In 1925 Audemars Piguet introduced the world's thinnest
pocket watch, at 1.32 millimeters. Only three years later the company created the first skeleton watch.
At the end of 1920s and the beginning of 1930s the success of
Audemars Piguet started dimming. The crash of the stock market as well
as the Depression slowed the development of many Swiss companies.
During World War II the manufacturer was able to come back on the
market by producing one of its well-known models – an ultra-thin
chronograph, the heart of which was Calibre 2003. The sales of Audemars
Piguet started growing in the forties and fifties. Together with
Jaeger-LeCoultre it designed the thinnest automatic movement. The
latter included a 21 carat gold rotor placed in the center. Their
"Royal Oak", was produced in 1972 and is considered to have created the
market for the stainless steel luxury watch. It was designed by Gerald Genta.
Today the company, along with Patek Philippe and Vacheron
Constantin, is sometimes claimed to be one of the top three Swiss
watchmakers. Every timepiece manufactured in-house is still made using the old-fashioned hand-made technique.[citation needed]
Audemars Piguet produces fewer than 30,000 timepieces per year. This production is far less than Swiss watch manufacturers, such as Rolex which produces 2,000 watches per day.
Sponsorships
Since 1999, Audemars Piguet has been the sponsor of the Queen
Elizabeth II Cup, a Group One Thoroughbred horse race in Hong Kong, New
Territories, China.
Audemars Piguet are also a sponsor of the Alinghi Sailing Team which won the America's Cup in 2003 & 2007
In 2007, Audemars Piguet offered its support to the Clinton
Foundation. The Foundation works around the world on global issues,
including education, health, poverty issues, and fight against
HIV/AIDS. The company created the Jules Audemars Clinton Foundation
Equation of Time watch in a limited edition of 126 pieces. The watch
incorporated complex astronomical features. It shows sunrise and sunset
times, perpetual calendar and astronomical moon.
Ambassadors
Like many other brands of luxury watches, Audemars Piguet has a
number of ambassadors, such as Indonesian-French singer Anggun and
Malaysian actress Michelle Yeoh, as well personalities and teams in
different sport categories such as cricket, softball, golf, skiing,
motor sports and sailing.
References
- ^ a b http://www.orolus.com/watchinfo/AP-info.shtml
- ^ http://www.thewatchquote.com/Audemars-Piguet-History-No_88.htm
- ^ a b http://www.cnbceb.com/Articles/2007/March/13/watches-too-long-a-shadow.aspx
- ^ E.g. by one dealer: http://www.orolus.com/watchinfo/AP-info.shtml
- ^ http://professionalwatches.com
- ^ Audemars Piguet Supports Clinton Foundation
- ^ Audemars Piguet (2008). "Partnerships". http://www.audemarspiguet.com/www08/en/sponsoring/sponsoring.html. Retrieved 2008-05-29.
See also
- List of watch manufactures
External links
- Official site
- Latest News on Audemars Piguet
- History of Audemars Piguet
- Emblematic models of Audemars Piguet
- Audemars Piguet on Youtube
- Article on Audemars Piguet, Le Brassus
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