The founder of SEIKO

SEIKO is a famous Japanese watch company; it was founded in 1881, the company formerly was known as Hattori timing shop, renamed in 1892 Seiko shop. In 1924, the first official Seiko brand watch was issued. In 1969, Seiko launched the world's first pointer type quartz watch -SEIKO ASTRON35SQ. In 1995, Seiko and Oriental Watch Company together created a joint venture. Seiko also is parent company of computer printer manufacturer –EPSON. 

 

The founder of SEIKO is Hattori Kitaro, and he was watchmaker apprentice. he complied with new trend and seized the chance of Japan studying western technology, introduced the watch making technology, realized his ideal, created his horological kingdom, also enabled him to win the "Oriental clock king" reputation.

 

Hattori Kitaro was born in 1860, after graduated from primary school he studied repairing watch technology in Tokyo Japanese Bridge and Black Gate Town of the valley area. In 1877, he opened the Hattori watch repairing shop, had the first try of his business.

 

In 1881, Hattori Kitaro only 21 years old in the Ginza officially opened Hattori clock shop, and this is the precursor of Seiko Corporation. At that time, in addition to repairing watches, he also wholesaled and sold American watches and Swiss watches that were imported from Yokohama. Because he could stick to good credit and got trust from foreign firm, his business was going smoothly.

 

Hattori Kitaro with a foresight in May 1892 bought a closed factory and founded Seiko, employed a watchmaker -- Yoshikawa Tsuruhiko as a technician, and from the imitation of R & D simple clock start, in July of the same year an American type wall clock was successfully launched and sale.

 

When Seiko was established, there are only 15 employees; machines mainly relied on manpower to work, so that a lot of manpower was wasted in polishing parts. Soon after, in order to enhance production efficiency, Hattori Kitaro moved their factories to new factories of Willow Island and installed five batch of HP steam machine to expand production, and Seiko clocks and watches also started to be exported to China.

 

In 1895, Seiko successfully launched TIME KEEPER pocket watch made by Japan; sales performance started to grow rapidly, and Seiko watches proudly laid consolidated position in watchmaking. Until 1903, when Kitaro was 43 years old, he was called "the king of Japanese timepiece” in the Japanese press.