Rectangular & Important: ESAQuartz Beta21

Contact now:

WhatsApp Instagram DM Email

WHY WE LOVE IT? Because it is an horological artefact of highest grade: not sold to the public but given or gifted to people engaged with the development of the first Swiss quartzmovement Beta21 and one of the rarest first Swiss quartzwatches at all. This special timepiece was one of the very few Beta21 exhibited on the Basle fair and then gifted by Ebauches SA to the director of the MusterMesse Basel ("muba).

ESA (Ebauches SA, later part of ETA SA and Swatch with technical lead-engineers André Beyner and Maurice Grimm) was one of the (if not THE) most important player in the Swiss watchindustry in 1970 and the biggest shareholder and most important participant in the Beta21-joint venture: the initiative for the joint-venture and 39.5% of the total capital came from Ebauches SA. ESA manufactured more mechanical watch-movements than any other Swiss brand at that time and obviously they had an intrinsic interest to get into quartz-movements and not miss the innovation -- and the pressure was there since Seiko presented the worlds first quartz-watch Astron cal35 on 25th of December 1969. So, it is fair to assume that without Rolex or Patek the Beta21-project would have been done anyway; but without ESA there would not (!) have been a Swiss quartzwatch in 1970, for sure.

Very obviously ESA had searched for a pragmatic approach to case several examples of this 1st Swiss quartz-movements (Beta21 Zero-Series) for demonstration purposes on the Basle Fair (Mustermesse Basel, "muba") in April 1970: rectangular and wrapping the oversized pioneer-movement. On this important fair the manufacturers and participants of the C.E.H.-joint venture presented the result of their research-efforts: the 1st working and marketed Swiss quartz-movement encased in the highlights and most expensive top-models of the manufacturers for 1970 and the following years: Patek "Cercle d’Or" ref3587, Piaget "Rectangle a l'Ancienne" ref14101 & "Black Tie" ref15101, Rolex "QUARTZ" ref5100, Omega "ElectroQuartz" ref196.005, IWC "QUARTZ-ELECTRONIC" ref3001 etc.

All these mentioned watches were first presented by the brands on the Basle-fair -- in total just 160 Beta21 were produced and ready to show. Many manufacturers were selling-out their de-facto limited editions right on this fair -- sold in 1970-Apr with production and delivery of the in total 6'000 Beta21s stretching until mid of 1972: we know so from Patek, Rolex and Piaget for sure. And here it becomes interesting: the ESAQuartz was never meant for sale, as ESA / ETA was a movement-manufacturer and not allowed to compete with watch-brands by selling complete watches. Instead they were just demonstrating the accurate movement and this specific example was given as a present to one of the most important persons of that presentation: the director of the Mustermesse Basel (short "muba") received it directly from ESA as a gift and owned it until his grandson received it from him.

Pragmatically cased, it is edgy (as the Beta21-movement) with an apple-pedicel-like crown at 12-o'clock -- giving it an unusual and interesting look. Notabene: the casemaker was Favre & Perret SA (La-Chaux-de-Fonds, Poincon de Maitre: Hammer[115], the casemaker that produced the ref3700 & ref3770 Nautilus for Patek and the Ra-Tourbillion ref25643 & ref25656 for Audemars Piguet) and so the same casemaker that made the world-record thinnest watch in 1979: the "Delirium Tres Mince" based on a ESA / ETA innovation (André Beyner and Maurice Grimm) and basis for the 1982-presented Swatch (NB2: ESA was part of that as well). So, back to the Beta21-case in 1970. Pragmatically, yes but it was not made cheap: the dial comes with a beautiful brown sunburst-effect and applied indexes and a very fine & discreet print below 6 o'clock: "SWISS MADE BETA 21". The case is all solid gold with the thick caseback alone weighting more than many complete goldwatch-cases. Even the outer part of the movement-holder is in solid 18K-whitegold. The oversized (42 * 17 * 36mm without lugs / 46mm lug-to-lug) and heavy (>110g) case is all original and appears sharp and unpolished. The edges are sharp and it seems like the watch was worn carefully but not often -- this corresponds to the original lizard-leather Ebauches SA-strap in fair condition. The all-original zero-series Beta21-movement (ESA cal9173) is working reliable and precise and of course has the hexagonal trimmer, so characteristic for the earliest of the Beta21-movements.