How will small brands like Christopher Ward survive Swatch's decision to cut back supply?In the seemingly never-ending saga that is the Swatch Group's decision to cease supply of ebauche movements to competitors, we have yet another update! This time, according to Fox Business News, Swatch has reached a draft agreement with Swiss competition authorities that would allow it to reduce the number of movements supplied to outsiders by 70% by 2018.
This is significant because Swatch, according to many reports, supplies roughly 80% of the movements used in Swiss-Made mechanical watches. This reduction comes on top of existing conditions that have allowed Swatch to, already, seriously limit the number of components and parts available to competitors. Here are some details: