regulate the industry prevented watch companies from introducing new technologies without permission. For Oris, the statute proved to be an obstacle; because until that point, Oris had been using pin-lever escapement (Roskopf escapement) movements, which were claimed to be less accurate than the lever escapements used by some of Oris’s competitors, who had adopted such technology before the law was passed. Despite successes with this technology, Oris took action against the Watch Statute. In 1956 the company’s General Manager Oscar Herzog hired a young lawyer by the name of Dr Rolf Portmann who spent his first 10 years at the company campaigning to reverse the Watch Statute. Subsequently, the Watch Statute was gradually liberalised until it was abolished in 1971. The Quartz Crisis By the end of the 1960s, 44 per cent of all watches sold worldwide originated in Switzerland. Oris employed 800 people across a network of factories in Hölstein and beyond, and produced 1.2 million watches and clocks a year, making it one of the 10 largest watch companies in the world. The company developed its own tools and machinery, and even ran an apprenticeship scheme, training 40 engineers and watchmakers every year. But then came the turning point. In the 1970s and early 1980s, quartz watches from Asia gained massive market share. The so-called ‘Quartz Crisis’ meant the end for around 900 watch companies in Switzerland and unemployment for two thirds of watch industry employees. Swiss manufacturers’ market share fell to 13 per cent worldwide. In 1970, Oris gave up its independence and became part of Allgemeine Schweizer Uhrenindustrie AG (ASUAG), the predecessor of the Swatch Group. Oris began to manufacture quartz watches, too. However, this did not restore success. In the early 1980s, Oris employed only a few dozen people. In 1981, the production of its own movements was abandoned. New beginnings Like many other Swiss watch manufacturers in the early 1980s, Oris was on the verge of closure. Managing Director Dr Rolf Portmann – who was instrumental in the reversal of the Watch Statute – and Head of Marketing Ulrich W. Herzog took over the remainder of the company in 1982 as part of a management buyout. Soon after, the newly formed and independent Oris SA elected to abandon quartz and produce solely mechanical timepieces in the mid-price segment. Oris made its last quartz watch in the early 1990s. It also produces a very small