Luxury watchmaking: World-first with an NFT auction
Jean-Claude Biver and the Swiss company WISeKey are leading the way, announcing the first
NFT auction of a luxury watch.
Where auctions are already soaring for works of art and intangibles, never before has a luxury watch been the subject of an NFT (Non Fungible Token) sale.
To make history, Jean-Claude Biver has symbolically chosen the famous Bigger Bang All Black Tourbillon Chronograph “Special piece”, a historic timepiece because of the major role it played in paving the way for today’s new trends, a watch that has made watchmaking history, a symbol of success, a source of inspiration that has made it Jean-Claude Biver’s favorite watch for over a quarter of a century.
This watch will be the first luxury watch to have a digital life with certified ownership and authenticity. This digital twin will be the “authentic” double of the physical watch in the digital space. A new chapter is opening.
Kick-off of the sale Wednesday, March 31, 2021 at 4:00pm CET, of the watch, its digital twin NFT, with its secure certificate of authenticity, on the OpenSea platform, the largest digital platform for NFT sales.
The final link on the NFT auction will be accessible from www.wisekey.com/wiseart/
The day before, Tuesday, March 30, 2021 at 4:00 pm (swiss time), Jean-Claude Biver and Carlos Moreira, CEO of WISeKey, will host a Live Chat to discuss the repercussions of such a sale and its significance for the watch industry. https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_z9XPb67_QfyXqXgT0CRQ1w
Geneva, Switzerland – March 29, 2021 – Jean-Claude Biver and Switzerland’s WISeKey International Holding Ltd (SIX: WIHN, NASDAQ: WKEY), a Swiss cybersecurity company, are leading the way in announcing the first historic NFT auction of a luxury watch.
The auction will take place on March 31, 2021 on the leading Open.Sea NFT MarketPlace, which is already active in the sale of artworks.
To mark the history of this first NFT sale of a luxury watch, Jean-Claude Biver has symbolically chosen the famous “Bigger Bang All Black Tourbillon Chrono “Special piece”, a historic piece for the major role it played in paving the way for today’s new trends, a watch that has marked the history of watchmaking, an emblem, a symbol of success, a cornerstone, a source of inspiration that has made it Jean-Claude Biver’s favorite watch.
Its never-before-seen ‘All Black’ color, its dial open to the movement to reveal the beautiful mechanics (again the best defense against counterfeiting at the time), its tourbillon in an ultra-contemporary design… This watch is a true icon because it opened up new fields of exploration, new trends that have become today’s standards. It symbolically represents the starting point of a whole new generation of contemporary watchmaking imagined and successfully initiated by Jean-Claude Biver at the time.
Jean-Claude Biver comments “This watch has brought me so much success and happiness. It is one of the most important watches in my private collection. It has not only inspired me professionally, but has also brought me so much personally.”
45 years of an extraordinary career. From the early years at Audemars Piguet, the amazing Blancpain adventure, the collaboration with Nicolas Hayek, Omega, then the dazzling development of Hublot, the presidency of the watchmaking division of the French group LVMH, the rejuvenation of TAG Heuer, the re-launch of Zenith, the creation of the first Swiss luxury connected watch with Google and Intel, or his commitment against racism during the EURO2008 and the Charity Water campaign with Depeche Mode to name but a few, not forgetting his swiss mountain cheese… Jean-Claude Biver is a living legend in the watch industry, characterized by his commitment to the Swiss watch industry, his spirit of daring and entrepreneurship, with passion.
Jean-Claude Biver and Carlos Moreira, CEO of WISeKey, launched 12 years ago at BaselWorld the first digital certification of a luxury watch https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIWx_Z6JdJA. They are now repeating this technology breakthrough with the use of Digital identification combined with NFT to use the existing digital certificate of authenticity on the Hublot watch and checking and creation of a Digital Twin with its corresponded Non–Fungible Token.
Today, they go again together for a new breakthrough linking watchmaking and new technologies with the use of digital identification combined with NFT to use the existing digital certificate of authenticity on the watch with the creation of a digital twin with corresponding NFT (Non Fungible Token).
“I am delighted to join JC Biver again in demonstrating how latest technologies can disrupt an entire industry such as the luxury watch industry. WISeKey is launching this first ever luxury watch NFT auction to demonstrate its technology and encourage luxury watch brands to start using it to auction their high-end watches through WIS.Watch NFTs. We launched two weeks ago a WISe.Art, a digital certificate of authenticity, a NFT for art pieces that will live forever on the blockchain, unchanged and unchallengeable, as proof of the buyer’s ownership. This announcement generated strong interest from the luxury and art community “said Carlos Moreira
WISeKey, was the first company in the world to use dual factor authentication combined with blockchain technology to secure luxury watches, currently protects over 2.5 million luxury watches. Since 2010, WISeKey has collaborated with manufactures of luxury watches deploying this unique technology to integrate semiconductors tags powered with its VaultIC154 NFC secure element and provide brands with the ability of:
- issuing a storage device comprising of a digital certificate of authenticity
- checking, when required, the validity of the digital certificate of authenticity
- modifying, when required, the status of validity of the digital certificate of authenticity.
Dematerialization and creation of a Digital Twin with its corresponded Non–Fungible Token.
These tags, when placed on any product and tapped by an NFC phone, securely authenticate, and track the product much like an embedded ePassport and confirm the identity of the product on the blockchain ledger. This technology has received a patent in the USA http://patft.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph-Parser?Sect1=PTO2&Sect2=HITOFF&p=1&u=%2Fnetahtml%2FPTO%2Fsearch-bool.html&r=8&f=G&l=50&co1=AND&d=PTXT&s1=wisekey&OS=wisekey&RS=wisekey
CONTACTS PRESSE
Marine Lemonnier-Brennan
289 Consulting
Marine.lemonnier@289consulting.com
T.+41 79 389 67 62
WISeKey International Holding Ltd
Company Contact: Carlos Moreira
Chairman & CEO
Tel: +41 22 594 3000
info@wisekey.com