CW design - delivery cycle

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Kansas City Milkman
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CW design - delivery cycle

Post by Kansas City Milkman »

Does anyone know how long it takes a CW to get from initial design to formal launch? Just having a Sunday night ponder about watches like the C65 SC, the redesign of the MK3 C60 and drawing board teasers in Loupe about the C60 aero and Sealander.

Of course, the delivery process may not run smooth - market changes, competitor activity, covid etc - but there will be somewhere an indicative view of the overall process from fag packet etching, design options, design selection all the way through to the point that official teasers become available.

6 months, 12 months, 18 months, longer?
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Amor Vincit Omnia
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Re: CW design - delivery cycle

Post by Amor Vincit Omnia »

Kansas City Milkman wrote: Sun Feb 28, 2021 9:06 pm Does anyone know how long it takes a CW to get from initial design to formal launch?

6 months, 12 months, 18 months, longer?
Trident 3 is the one I know about.

It was launched on May 1st 2019. We (Admin Team) were at Maidenhead for talks at the end of May 2018. We spent a session with Mike, Chris and Adrian when they unveiled detailed drawings and plans of the watches and the new QR bracelets. We were sworn to secrecy, of course.

When we met again in November 2018 (the meeting that prompted the genesis of the Archive) they had working prototypes, and they also revealed the 40mm model, which they had kept secret from us in the spring. Kip nearly fell off his chair!

So we knew all about it 11 months before launch, but it had clearly been on the boards for some time before that.
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Richard D
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Re: CW design - delivery cycle

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Adrian told me that the design for the C1 WorldTimer came to him whilst hiking in the Swiss Alps. That was several months before any formal drawings were produced. In total I would say from the initial idea the C1 took over two years to come production.
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Re: CW design - delivery cycle

Post by Kansas City Milkman »

Thanks AVO and Richard. Those timings makes sense given the technical complexities of the World Timer and the requirement to get their biggest seller, C60, right. R&D of other innovations like the sapphire will also add to the development period. That said, ‘facelifted’ variations eg different flavours of C60 will be significantly quicker to market. Either way, the R&D investment aligned to speed to market will be critical factors too.

Thanks for responding to my musings....
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