Tag Heuer

The company's connection to motor racing began to take shape in the early twentieth century as automobile sport became a mass spectacle requiring accurate time measurement. Heuer supplied stopwatches and dashboard timers to racing teams for decades before the relationship deepened under Jack Heuer, Edouard's great-grandson, who took over management in the 1960s. In 1962 Jack attended the 12 Hours of Sebring in Florida and heard mention of the Carrera Panamericana, a now-defunct Mexican road race notorious for its speed and danger. He registered the name immediately and launched the Heuer Carrera chronograph at the Basel Fair in 1963. The watch was designed specifically for drivers, with a legible dial, a tachymetre scale, and a case sized for a racing glove.

In 1969 Heuer introduced the Monaco, the first automatic square chronograph with water resistance, featuring the in-house Calibre 11 movement developed jointly with Breitling, Hamilton-Buren, and the movement maker Dubois Depraz. The Monaco became wider still in public consciousness after Steve McQueen wore it during production of the 1971 film Le Mans. That same year Heuer began sponsoring Formula 1 cars, one of the first watch brands to place its logo on a racing livery.

In 1985 the Techniques d'Avant Garde group purchased a majority stake in the company, and the combined entity took the name TAG Heuer. Under this ownership the brand deepened its Formula 1 ties, becoming a primary sponsor for McLaren during the period when Ayrton Senna drove for the team and won three world championships. LVMH acquired near-full ownership in 1999 and has since invested in both traditional mechanical production and, from 2015, the brand's own line of connected watches.

At Nordic auction houses, TAG Heuer watches appear across 92 lots, with Kaplans Auktioner in Sweden accounting for 35 of those sales alone. The Carrera consistently leads prices: a Carrera herreklokke reached 65,000 NOK, a Formula 1 chronograph sold for 19,742 SEK, and a Carrera Calibre 5 brought 15,000 SEK. The presence of the brand at generalist houses alongside specialist venues like Bukowskis Stockholm confirms a broad base of interest.