Do a Google search for silicium. You will find 1,500,000 results for this most common of metalloids otherwise known as silicon (Si14). Beginning at number 11, you will find results relating to watchmaking (these search results are current, from February 2009). This is remarkable, considering that silicium has a wide variety of industrial uses and did not even figure in watchmaking until the end of the 20th century. What is even more remarkable is how much coverage one brand, Ulysse Nardin, has managed to get on this subject, forever linking the brand with the material.

While the ever-mighty Rolex conducted experiments into this material in the 1990s, they never discussed it. Editorial and marketing forays into the subject probably began in this century. The steadily increasing pace of development and deployment of silicium in mechanical watches may appear to have caught the industry and the press off-guard but the prevalence of the word silicium itself is a sign that we are witnessing a marketing and publicity triumph alongside an industrial one.

To make a longish story shorter, silicium has clear advantages over traditional materials when it comes to precision engineering and in reducing friction. What is clear is that this material does have a legitimate industrial and functional role to play in watchmaking. Nowhere is this more evident than at Le Locle-based Ulysse Nardin – possibly one of the most forward-thinking and relevant brands on the market today. To give credit where credit is due, Ulysse Nardin has truly hit its stride again under the leadership of Rolf Schnyder.