Why Ulysse Nardin chief is unfazed by the smartwatch

Times were good for Patrick Pruniaux In 2013 he was in Switzerland as global sales director of TAG Heuer and things were going well, he says So much so, in fact, that he caught the eye of tech behemoth Apple An eight-month “dating period” ensued for Mr Pruniaux that included trips to California and several interviews.

He was offered the job — though it had still not been made explicit to him exactly what he was being hired for. “Even when I signed they never told me I would be working on a watch Obviously, I was pretty much sure it was for the watch, because they would have made a terrible mistake by hiring me for my software development skills,” he jokes. Mr Pruniaux spent a year in Cupertino, California, as part of the special project team working on the Apple watch He was then offered a more operational role and moved. More