Oris

Oris was founded in 1904 in Hölstein by Paul Cattin and Georges Christian, who took over a local watch factory and named it after a nearby brook. Its early production was pin-lever watches, and the Big Crown Pointer Date, with its oversized crown, dates from 1938. The Swiss Watch Statute of 1934 barred the company from moving to lever escapements; Rolf Portmann, a lawyer hired in 1956, led the campaign that ended with the statute's repeal in 1971.

Oris joined the ASUAG group in 1970; in 1982, during the quartz crisis, Portmann and Ulrich Herzog bought the company out, and it has since been independent and made mechanical watches only. Since 2002 its automatic movements have carried a red rotor. In-house calibres returned with Calibre 110 (2014, ten-day power reserve) and Calibre 400 (2020, five-day reserve, antimagnetic). The main lines are the Aquis divers, the Divers Sixty-Five (2015), the Big Crown ProPilot and the Big Crown Pointer Date.