Watch Blog

If you think that a watch beating at 7.2 million beats per hour sounds fast, then you'd be right. This is the pulse rate of the TAG Heuer Mikrogirder 2000, a new concept watch unveiled at TAG Heuer's pre-Basel event held in Geneva last week.

To put this into context, the Mikrogirder beats twice as fast at the previous record-holder, the TAG Heuer Mikrotimer, and 250-times as fast as a regular watch. There is of course of a purpose to this ultra-high frequency, and that's to allow for a more accurate chronograph - the party trick of the Mikrogirder is its ability to record minute fractions of time, being the first watch able to time events to an accuracy of 5/ 10,000th of a second.

TAG Heuer this week announced a new Formula 1 series at a launch event in Geneva. The new Formula 1 is an evolution of today's series, with a focus on upgraded components and finishing, as well as introducing ceramic for the first time in a TAG Heuer men's series. But the key attraction of the Formula 1 has always been bold designs and sportiness, and the new watches deliver these qualities through both the core range and the introduction of two "high performance models".

2012 will be another year of anniversaries for TAG Heuer. It will be 50 years since the launch of the Autavia series and 30 years since the launch of the 2000/ Aquaracer series. But more important than those two anniversaries, is that it will also mark the 80th birthday of Jack Heuer, the great-grandson of TAG Heuer founder Edouard Heuer.

Take a look at today's TAG Heuer range and you see what an impact one man can have on a watch company. The Carrera, Silverstone, Monaco and Aquaracer series were all designed and developed during Jack's twenty years running Heuer from 1962-1982.

Many of articles which I've written on the modern TAG Heuer range have focused on the heritage of today's models and how they evolved from designs of the Heuer era - the name of TAG Heuer before 1985. The Monaco, Carrera, Silverstone and Aquaracer ranges all started life as Heuer designs. But the TAG Heuer Formula 1 is different; it's a pure TAG Heuer design. In fact, it was the first new watch designed by TAG after it took over Heuer.

While today's Aquaracer range is one of the most modern in the TAG Heuer range, the heritage of the series actually dates back to 1982 when it was one of the last series introduced by Jack Heuer before the Heuer company was sold - eventually becoming TAG Heuer in 1985. Back then, the watch was known as the 2000-series and like today, was a full range of dive watches with a variety of automatic and quartz movements.

The introduction of the Grand Carrera in 2007 was a major milestone for TAG Heuer. The watch took more than four years to develop, with the design of the watch going through countless design and re-design phases until the final shape was signed off.

Eagle-eyed watch fans will have noticed that Lewis Hamilton wore a TAG Heuer Silverstone during this year's British Grand Prix, a fitting choice of watch given that the race is held at the famous Silverstone circuit.

TAG Heuer is due to launch a luxury smartphone called the LINK, which it describes as "the ultimate communication tool."

This year TAG Heuer has announced four new watches that extend deep into the realm of high-end haute horlogerie watchmaking, each with a innovative TAG Heuer designed and built movement and prices that start at around $50,000 but reach almost double that amount.