Who says history doesn’t repeat itself" Zenith earned the attention and acclaim of the wristwatch world with the heralded launch of the El Primero, the world’s highest-frequency self-winding chronograph movement, in 1969, and did so again just two years ago with another epic achievement in chronometry, the Zenith Defy Lab and its revolutionary Zenith Oscillator. The Defy Lab, an extremely limited, pre-sold series of timepieces, has now gone into serial production as the Defy Inventor, unveiled at Baselworld 2019 as a headliner of Zenith’s 50th anniversary celebration of the El Primero.

The Zenith Defy Inventor is equipped with the patented regulating organ, developed at Zenith’s manufacture, which made its debut in the 10-piece Lab series and replaces a traditional sprung balance. The Zenith Oscillator is a single-piece, ultra-thin mechanism made of monocrystalline silicon (as compared to the 30-odd parts that make up a standard balance) that oscillates at a breakneck pace of 108,000 vph, or 18 Hz, dwarfing even the then-unprecedented 36,600-vph (5 Hz) of the El Primero. Its pulsations are visible from the dial side of the movement thanks to an openworked architecture. Among the benefits of this control system: increased reliability thanks to eliminating the need for 30 or more moving parts and thus decreasing friction, wear, and deformation; stability thanks to silicon’s temperature-resistant and antimagnetic properties; and added precis...