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About IWC Watches
IWC or International Watch Co is a Swiss watch manufacturer located in Schaffhausen, Switzerland.
IWC Schaffhausen is well-known for being the only major Swiss watch factory situated in eastern Switzerland, as the common of most famous Swiss watch manufacturers are located in western Switzerland.
Back in 1868, an American engineer and watchmaker Florentine Ariosto Jones who had been a director of E. Howard & Co., in Boston, then America's leading watch making company founded the International Watch Company with the intention of combining the craftsmanship of the Swiss with the modern engineering technology from the U.S., to manufacture movements and watch parts for the American market.
At that time, wages in Switzerland were relatively low although there was a ready supply of skilled watch making labor, mainly carried out by people in their homes. Jones encountered opposition to his plans in French-speaking Switzerland because people feared for their jobs and the work they did at home, because Jones wanted to open a factory.
The town of Schaffhausen was in danger of being left behind in the Industrial Age.
It was at this stage that watch manufacturer and industrialist Johann Heinrich Moser stepped in and did the region a huge change in revolution.
As a pioneer of white coal, he built Schaffhausen's first hydroelectric plant and laid the cornerstone for future industrialization.
He then met F.A. Jones in Le Locle and showed great interest in his plans.
Together, they laid the foundations for the first and only watch manufacturers in north-eastern Switzerland: The International Watch Company in Schaffhausen.
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IWC Watch Series
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