The Swatch Group on the Internet time

I. BACKGROUND 1838 Louis Audemars invents stem winding and setting mechanism 1868 Patek Philippe makes the first wrist watch 1888 Cartier produces ladies wrist watch with diamond and gold bracelet 1902 The first Omega wrist watch is produced 1904 One of the most famous early wrist watches appears ? the Santos-Dumont producedby the house of Cartier 1910 Longines begins wrist watch production 1923 Invention of the automatic wrist watch by John Hardwood 1925 Patek Philippe produces the first wrist watch with a perpetual calendar 1927 First water resistant Rolex Oyster produced 1933 First watch made for children by Ingersoll 1945 Rolex Date is the first watch with a date display on the watch face 1953 Lips produce the first battery powered watch 1957 Hamilton produces the first electric watch 1969 Girard-Perregaux develops the first mass-produced quartz watch Neil Armstrong wears the Omega Speedmaster Professional on the moon 1972 Longines launches and LCD wrist watch 1983 Swatch is launched 1990 Worldwide demand exceeded supply ? people started to trade, sell, and speculate with Swatches US Swatch sales were faltering 1991 Partnership with Siemens to introduce cordless phone 1994 Formation of MCC 1998 Smart Car was launched Oct. SIT was launched ? hits on Swatch homepage was 13M/mo.

II. CASE PROBLEM How can Swatch Internet Time become a tool for brand enhancement and brand awareness for The Swatch Group? III. ANALYSIS The Swatch Group Competitive Environment · Timex held 30.6% of the U.S. watch market in 1998, compared to Swatch?s 1.6%. Other Swatch Group brands held less than 1% - Hamilton (0.7%), Tissot (0.7%), Omega (0.5%), and Rado (0.2%).

· The core competencies of Swatch lie in its first-rate manufacturing of watches. Swatch is also strong in microtechnology, micromechanics, and microelectronics.

Target Market · Swatch targets young people at the beginning of their career who do not want to pay a very high price for a watch or a car. But who might buy a