While we can’t know the future, it’s certainly fun to predict it. Here’s one possibility about what the future holds for some of our beloved brands in the watchmaking industry: I believe that 20-40 years from now, it’s highly likely that a mid-to-large tech company will acquire the brands with the most compelling histories and design catalogs. The brands I’m talking about are probably familiar to you. Brands like Patek Philippe and Omega are brands that have been around for over 100 years. Others, like Vacheron Constantin, date back even further, all the way to the 18th century.
Enthusiasts often forget that many of today’s leading luxury watch brands have disappeared, only to be resurrected by investors later. In the 1990s and early 2000s, when the luxury watch industry was experiencing a new boom, existing watch companies, luxury goods groups, and enthusiastic entrepreneurs purchased the intellectual property rights (and often design catalogs, machinery, products, etc.) of many brands that were no longer in business. The reality is that even if a watch company in its current form ceases to operate, the value of the brand and its intellectual property continues. These names, technologies, or designs rarely ever enter the public domain, and even defunct brands almost always still have owners. This means that even if a watch brand disappears, its intellectual property rights continue to exist, and only those who own those rights can revive the brand.
Many of today’s watch brands will not exist in 20 years. I would not be surprised if 50% of today’s watch companies are gone in 20 years. The brands that survive are those that have managed to capture the traditional jewelry-style watch market, which is primarily a status item, a collectible piece of art, and a symbol of taste and wealth. Other watch brands that survive are those that have fully or partially entered the smartwatch market (meaning they may continue to make traditional watches as well). It is possible that in 20 years, “smartwatches” will no longer be called by that name, but simply “watches.” Traditional watches that we call “watches” today may adopt new names to indicate their updated status.
So what does the future hold for luxury? In reality, it won’t be much different than it is today. People still look for names and designs that suggest historical or timeless taste, excellence, success, or simple reliability. This means that older names in watchmaking still hold value for luxury consumers, even if the original products they were selling were not. We’ve seen this many times with other luxury brands. Hermes is very popular with luxury seekers, but how many consumers buy a horse saddle? Louis Vuitton is one of the most powerful luxury manufacturers in the world, but how many people carry a leather trunk? If a brand like Tissot disappears as a traditional watchmaker, I don’t see why it can’t be resurrected as a smartwatch company. Consumers expect watch companies to make modern products, not vintage tools that are no longer relevant in fashion. The Omega of the future could easily be what we call a smartwatch today, without going against consumer expectations or the brand’s heritage.
Old-school watchmaking brands have (sometimes) very colorful histories, which makes them attractive acquisition targets for technology companies in the future. I’m not saying that all smartwatches will leverage traditional watch brands for consumer success, but I suspect that at least some will. My guess is that smartwatches will become large enough as a product category that there are dozens of good options on the market. Of course, this is a few years away, but once technical standards become more ubiquitous and the basic mainstream utility of smartwatches is understood (think cars, for example), product differentiation will be about aesthetics, materials, and construction.
If you were the CEO of a tech company and you wanted to create a brand focused on selling premium smartwatches, would you invent something entirely new, or would you try to capture the credibility and heritage of an older, respected brand and revive it for modern customers? Many would likely feel that making a modest investment in an older, now defunct brand, rich in history and interesting stories, would be more interesting, and probably more cost-effective, than creating a new brand from scratch.
TAG Heuer already makes smartwatches, with roots dating back to the 19th century. Though it still makes mostly traditional watches, it makes sense to see its brand name on a smartwatch. The concept becomes even stranger when you imagine a Breguet smartwatch? So, if Abraham-Louis Breguet were alive and trying to create watches with the highest performance and ease of use for the world’s most elite clients, what would he invest in today? There’s a good chance that those creations have a battery and a computer processor somewhere in them.
There are still many people who remember a time when everyone needed a watch to tell time. In the 1970s and 1980s, consumers no longer needed mechanical watches, and by the 1990s, as it became easier to tell time using other devices such as home appliances and mobile phones, consumers began to abandon wristwatches altogether. Nevertheless, it is easy to understand why companies such as Rolex continue to make high-quality watches even though their products are primarily used as fine jewelry. Jump forward 50 years and what will become of Rolex? What kind of watches would it have made sense for them to make then? Would there still be a culture of wanting, wearing, and showing off mechanical watches, just like there is today? Would the nature of luxury watches change so much that Rolex would be forced to start making fancy cases and bracelets (as only they can) to house modern, smart technology rather than mechanical internals?
A fictional Omega Speedmaster 1957 smartwatch
The Rolexes of the world (and there aren’t many of them) have a chance to remain solvent for 20-50 years and can choose how they enter the modern watch world in the future. Other brands forced to close long ago by the shrinking traditional watch market will return, whether we like it or not. Future tech companies and smartwatch makers will (I predict) take today’s best brands in traditional watchmaking and resurrect them for a new era of increased wristwatch status symbols and self-esteem.
