Citizen

The origins of Citizen trace back to 1918 when Kamekichi Yamazaki, Chief Secretary of the Tokyo Commercial and Industrial Timepiece Cooperative, established the Shokosha Watch Research Institute with the goal of creating domestically-produced Japanese pocket watches. The 'Citizen' brand name was first registered in Switzerland in 1918 by Swiss watchmaker Rodolphe Schmid for watches he sold in Japan. In 1930, Japanese and Swiss investors formally founded Citizen Watch Co., Ltd., taking over the Shokosha institute and some facilities from Schmid's Yokohama assembly plant. Count Gotō Shinpei supported the brand's development in the 1920s with hopes of making watches affordable to the general public. Citizen's pre-WWII growth relied on technology transfer from Switzerland. In 1959, Citizen launched the Parawater, Japan's first fully waterproof wristwatch. The company pioneered Eco-Drive light-powered technology and launched the world's first multi-band atomic timekeeping watch in 1993. Citizen expanded globally through strategic acquisitions, purchasing Bulova in 2008 for $250 million and the Frédérique Constant Group in 2016, making Citizen one of the world's largest watchmakers.