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Zenith CEO Julien Tornare aims to wake ‘sleeping beauty’ with innovation
STORYKim Soo-jin
Tornare will follow up groundbreaking Defy Lab collection with Defy Innovator
Julien Tornare was the man that LVMH head of watchmaking, and interim CEO of Zenith, Jean-Claude Biver turned to when he was looking for a CEO to turn things around after some disappointing results. Tornare had risen through the ranks at Vacheron Constantin, which he joined in 2000, and eventually became managing director.
While Biver gave himself six months to find the right person, Tornare was named and confirmed within three and started in his new post on May 1.
First on his to-do list is to launch a new oscillator pioneered by Zenith. Heralded as “the first new oscillator since Christiaan Huygens in 1675,” it is not a claim that can be lightly taken – or made.
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We met Tornare a few weeks before the launch to discuss his key goals, insights into the new oscillator, and how he plans to revive the brand.
Biver has commented on Zenith’s disappointing performance and the need for the brand to reinvent itself. What are some of your key goals?
Looking at the history of the brand, it’s been very innovative. The founder was the first one to put all the different crafts under the same roof [and] make watches [fully in-house].
[Biver and I] were discussing and thinking that our industry often turns to the past and sometimes brands are simply repeating the past, repeating what has been done in the past, either its complication or design or [whatever], but often lacking innovation. So [we said] let’s put innovation back into the watches, into our brand – and that’s how we decided to launch two different things this year: the Defy 21 [launched at Baselworld] and a new oscillator that’s a kind of a revolution.
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