ETA SA

The company traces its origins to 1793, when four master watchmakers opened the first ébauche workshop in Fontainemelon, Neuchâtel. In 1856, Urs Schild and Josef Girard established an ébauche factory in Grenchen that would become Eterna, which spun off its movement division as ETA in 1896. In 1926, ETA and the Fontainemelon manufacturer participated in creating Ébauches SA. Through successive mergers, ETA absorbed AS in 1978 and consolidated all Ébauches SA and FHF operations under the ETA name in 1985. The company also absorbed notable movement makers Valjoux, Peseux, and Lemania. ETA became part of SMH (later renamed Swatch Group in 1998) and controls the majority of Swiss movement production. In 2002, Swatch Group announced ETA would phase out supplying movements to non-group companies, triggering a Swiss Competition Commission investigation.