Presenting NeoCare by the Esperare Foundation.

As some of us know the watchmaking industry is sometimes linked with other industries which are helping each other. For example, luckily the military industry is not always using their inventions on weapons but sometimes they are used more peacefully on watches. An example is the diamond-like carbon (DLC) which was developed by the military industry but was used more peacefully on our watches as well.

We have few other examples as the aeronautic industry, where even some patents used in the late sixties to go to the moon, were finally also used by our watchmaking industry (velcro for example). In the other direction, as most of us know, Omega watches were used to go to the moon and also to come back from the moon, well illustrated in the movie Apollo 13. The "tic tac" of our industry was often used in many places such as aeroplane cockpits, decades ago, and the same on ships with the Naviquartz of Patek Philippe for example.

Now let's come to “saving lives”. The pharmaceutical and medical industry is also linked to our industry, with cleaning processes for example. Also, many young apprentice watchmakers still remember the comments of their teachers while receiving some of their tools in the first year of their apprenticeship, the milling cutters they receive are the same tools dentists are using. The stainless steel used on most of our watches is the same used for most of the tools of surgeons. And many suppliers of our watch industry are also suppliers of the pharmaceutical and medical industries. On CNC machines you can make parts for watches but also hip or knee prostheses.

That being said, we have here a great example where watchmakers helped another industry, the medical industry, and we may even say helped to save lives. A project was in the drawer for near to twenty years and was revived by several partners during the last couple of months. We speak here about an implant that was adjusted to be used on the main artery of the heart of children in order to regulate the flow of blood all these are regulated thanks to a mechanism that is very close to our quartz movements.

That small implant is made with a main plate, bridges, gears, 15 rubies, screws, bobbins and a motor, components that you all find on a quartz movement. All this is made and assembled by Schwarz Etienne. Also interesting to add is that an electronic part, a kind of antenna, is part of it and can receive instruction from the other side of the skin in order to adapt the implant to the growing child without the need of a more intrusive surgery.

Under the impulse of the Geneva-based Foundation EspeRare, this project was supervised by the Haute Ecole d'Ingénierie et de Gestion (HEIG) based in Yverdon in the Canton of Vaud and the assembly of the engine is performed by Schwartz Etienne. Some of you will maybe recognize the building of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Lausanne where a part of our video was made. For the insider, you will maybe even recognize one building of that institute called Rolex Learning Center.

Yes we can clearly say watchmaking is sometimes saving lives and… VIVA WATCHMAKING

For more info, please visit their website here: https://esperare.org/