They began designing and manufacturing movement components many years before ETA made the decision to limit the sale and production of movements which made them perfectly poised to support the needs of the industry as ETA withdrew from the market. Sellita has been assembling movements and watches for the Swiss industry for 70 years and they were an important partner of ETA for many years. Sellita’s history isn’t as extensive as that of ETA, but it is substantial nevertheless. Third Wheel Sellita SW200-1 (left) ETA 2824-2 (right) Ironically Eterna is currently owned by the Chinese conglomerate Citychamp Watch & Jewellery Group and has developed a completely separate set of watch movements with no connection to the workhorses that appeared in their watches throughout the middle of the 20th century.

A series of acquisitions and mergers that took place throughout the 20th century resulted in the creation of SMH and later the Swatch Group which today includes the intellectual property of dozens of watch movement manufactures including most notably, ETA, ESA, Valjoux, Lemania, and of course, Omega. By 1926 the mergers and consolidations had already begun when ETA AS (the movement division of Eterna) and FHF (Fabrique d’Horlogerie de Fontainemelon) created Ebauces Ltd. In 1896 Eterna established a division focused solely on watch movements. The company’s roots began with the Eterna watch company which was founded in 1856. The ETA we know today is the result of the consolidation and vertical acquisitions of the Swiss watch industry. Next, let’s look at the history of these two brands.

This certainly adds some value to the watch because of the Rolex know-how that goes into the most critical components in these watches.

Tudor uses what the industry has always called an ebauche and then makes modifications in-house. Like they have always done with ETA movements, Tudor will surely be using their own escapement, regulation system, and oscillator with custom finishing. This isn’t the first article to be written on the topic and it certainly won’t be the last but with the release of the Tudor Royal featuring the caliber T601 based on a Sellita movement, I thought it was a good time to provide a watchmaker’s perspective on these two watch movements.įirst, let’s acknowledge that Tudor will not be dropping a Sellita movement straight out of the package in their new models.

80.111 calibre watches