Concord Watch's CEO Vincent Perriard Resigns, Joins TechnoMarine

by Ariel Adams (RSS feed)
Jun 11th 2009 at 7:01AM

Concord and I have had a funny little brief history as I have not been as kind to their watch designs as they would have hoped for. I reviewed such watches at their "$$$,$$$" priced Quantum Gravity Tourbillon with less than jovial enthusiasm. Concord even responded to me via their CEO Vincent Perriard who admirably defended the brand, and his ideas. It was a sign of his dedication to his position and the brand that he helped rebuild. Now that dedication has waned and Mr. Perriard has resigned from Concord, to be effective as soon as possible. He will now take the helm at TechnoMarine, a wholly different type of watch company fitting into a lower end segment with much higher volume production.

I have to ask myself whether this move was prompted by Mr. Perriard's outgrowing of Concord, or vice versa. There have been many critics (such as myself) of where Concord strayed during its "re-birth." Others seemingly loved it as a few of the watches even received design awards. Though I suppose not all was well, and now the critics may have prevailed as Concord might have the possibility to offer arguably more "marketable" watches under new leadership (as of now still undecided). I can't speak as to the sentiments on each side of the table, but I sense a degree of "bad blood" as it appears Perriard ditched camp before his time was due - leaving Concord floundering to fill the position and delicately plan its future. We will see what types of new ideas Perriard can breathe into TechnoMarine that has traditionally enjoyed a fair amount of market success.

Via WorldTempus (in French).

Ariel Adams publishes the luxury watch review site aBlogtoRead.com.

Tags: ceo, concord, resign, swiss, timepieces, vincent perriard, VincentPerriard, watches