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This movement was a tour de force and so advanced that 20 years later in 1988, when Rolex required a more advanced movement to install in its Daytona Chronograph, it chose to fit the Zenith El Primero movement. Put simply, in 1969 Zenith produced the world’s first automatic chronograph, the El Primero. Zenith has also been recognised with more than 1500 awards and has over 50 individual movement designs to its name, making it the Swiss brand with the most awards for precision. Just a brief look inside the case-back of any chronograph is enough to demonstrate how complicated these watches are – making these very expensive watches to design and produce. The technical expertise and craftsmanship which went into these was immense. Notably, in 1929, Zenith won world renown at Kew Observatory (England), when a Zenith wristwatch won first prize for accuracy of better than 0.6 seconds per day.ĭuring the late 1940s and throughout the 1950s, Zenith held the lead in producing many of the most commercially successful and most advanced chronograph wristwatches. The company has an almost unparalleled record of technical achievements. 1865 and one of only a handful which still produces all its own mechanical movements today.
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Zenith is one of the oldest watch companies, est.
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