The Swiss dominate world watchmaking. Everyone knows it. Swiss watches are like champagne or parmesan: a reputation monopoly so absolute that we’ve forgotten anything else could exist.

Except in Morteau, in the Haut-Doubs, twenty minutes from the Swiss border, a workshop of about thirty people manufactures the only mechanical movement entirely designed and assembled in France. Not “assembled in France with Swiss components.” Designed AND assembled. In France.

The workshop is called Pequignet. And its story is one of the most improbable in contemporary watchmaking.

The Horse Breeder

Émile Pequignet was not a watchmaker. He bred horses. But in 1973, driven by a parallel passion for watches, he founded his brand in Morteau, in what is called the “cradle of French watchmaking.” A valley in the Jura where watches had been made for centuries, before the Swiss, on the other side of the mountain, took everything.

For thirty years, Pequignet made honest watches. Swiss movements, French casing. Like many French brands of the time: designed here, the heart came from elsewhere. It was the standard model. It worked. It left no trace.

The Crazy Bet

Didier Leibundgut, former director of Zenith France and then international marketing director of the manufacture, bought the brand in 2004 and steered it towards mechanical haute horlogerie. The decision was made: to create an entirely French manufacture caliber.

To gauge the extent of the madness, one must understand what “manufacture caliber” means. It is the mechanical movement, the engine of the watch, the assembly of microscopic components that make the hands turn. Most brands, including Swiss brands selling for between 5,000 and 10,000 euros, buy their movements from two or three suppliers (ETA, Sellita). They case, they do not manufacture. Creating one’s own caliber means years of R&D, millions in investment, and skills that must be trained or poached.

It is a gamble that multi-billion dollar groups hesitate to take. And this is what a small house in Morteau decided to attempt.

The Calibre Royal

First presented at the Baselworld fair in 2010, the Calibre Royal (EPM 01) was born after several years of development. The only mechanical movement entirely designed and assembled in France.

It is not a style exercise. It is an automatic movement that works, has been certified, and runs in watches sold to people who wear them. A movement with its own patents, its own technical innovations, hand assembled in a workshop in the Haut-Doubs.

Since then, the Calibre Royal has been declined in several versions: automatic, GMT (dual time zone), chronograph, then the more accessible Calibre Initial. A French manufacture GMT caliber, when you think about it, is almost surreal. Twenty years ago, it did not exist. Fifteen years ago, no one believed in it.

The Fall

Ambition has a cost. In 2012, Pequignet narrowly avoided bankruptcy.

Years of Calibre Royal development devoured reserves. Watchmaking R&D is a money pit: prototypes, trials, failures, restarts. All for a tiny market, since “Made in France” in watchmaking impresses no one. “Swiss Made” is the sesame. The rest is invisible.

This is the paradox of Pequignet: having accomplished a technical feat that the market does not reward. Having created what no one else in France has managed to create, and nearly disappearing precisely because of it.

The Rescues

In July 2012, Laurent Katz and Philippe Spruch bought Pequignet. Their background had nothing to do with watchmaking: they came from LaCie, the designer hard drive manufacturer (sold to Seagate). But the DNA was the same: tech, precision, design, an obsession with well-designed objects.

They restructured, stabilized, relaunched. But the watch market further deteriorated. In 2016, another judicial liquidation. This time, four employees of the manufacture took over in 2017, with a handful of colleagues. No investment funds, no luxury group. Watchmakers who refused to let their caliber die.

The bet is perhaps even bolder than the initial creation. To take over a French watch brand twice almost dead, in a market dominated by Switzerland, with a caliber that the general public ignores, one must believe. They believe.

Morteau, Today

About thirty artisans. EPV (Entreprise du Patrimoine Vivant) since 2014, renewed in 2019 and 2025. Watches between 3,000 and 15,000 euros.

To put the prices in perspective: a watch from a major Swiss house equipped with a comparable manufacture movement rarely starts below 8,000 euros, and quickly climbs. Pequignet offers a manufacture caliber (its own, not a purchased and decorated movement) at a price that remains accessible for the segment.

The Royale 300, 42mm case, automatic Calibre Royale, minimalist dial: this is the brand’s manifesto. The kind of watch one buys to support a cause as much as to tell time. Wearing a Pequignet is saying that French watchmaking exists.

To be honest: the Attitude range (Swiss movements, starting from 1,500 euros) is correct without being exceptional. The interest of Pequignet is the Calibre Royale. The rest is standard.

What It Tells

Pequignet is not a perfect brand. It is a courageous brand. Perhaps the most courageous in French watchmaking.

“Swiss Made” remains the only sesame. Fashion brands stick an ETA movement into a 5,000 euro case and call it haute horlogerie. Conglomerates buy century-old names to sell dreams in series. And meanwhile, a workshop of about thirty people in Morteau continues to manufacture a movement that no one asked it to create.

Nomos Glashütte, in Germany, does comparable work: an independent manufacture, in-house calibers, honest prices, an obsession with design. They are the German counterpart to this discreet resistance. Pequignet is the French counterpart. Alone.

Watchmaking reveres “Swiss Made” as a sesame. Pequignet dares “Made in France.” It is courageous, sometimes fragile, always respectable.

There are still people who make things with care. In Morteau, there are about thirty of them, and they keep the hands turning.