Luxury Watchmaker Patek Philippe's Swiss Owner Philippe Stern Now A Billionaire

Patek Philippe, one of the world's most prestigious luxury watch companies, has been run by the Stern family of Geneva since 1932. Today, some of its luxury watches fetch more than $ 5 million apiece  and are sold worldwide through specialty dealers such as Tiffany, Tourneau and Henri Stern.

Patek Philippe watches are the epitome of class worn by the chic elite and always made with the finest materials. Jack Welch, former CEO of General Electric and one of the most influential businessman of the last century, is wearing a Patek Philippe watch on the cover of his book Winning. Patek Philippe watches do not try to speak too loudly to create a huge impression: instead the prices that the old pieces fetch at auctions and the veneration of the collectors do the talking. “Patek Philippe limits the number of items they produce,” said one analyst, about the company’s strategy. Although sales have been rising to over $1 billion in 2013 and thousands of pieces are produced yearly, the halo of exclusivity of the brand has not been diluted.

Patek Philippe targets those who appreciate exquisite timepieces and can afford them. That includes billionaires and millionaires, the numbers of which have been increasing around the world in recent years. In March 2014, FORBES found 1,645 billionaires worldwide, a record figure overall and also a record in such regions as Asia. In an interview to Hodinkee,  one of the most widely read wristwatch publications in the world, Thierry Stern, member of the fourth generation to lead the family business, described his views about the future -and the past- of Patek and Philippe:

“Everything is circular. In watches, nothing is new, it’s just moving and coming back. Now maybe, everyone talks about the Chinese customers.  You can’t live without them, but you can’t live only with them, which is very important to remember. You have to be global, too many brands today are looking only to the Chinese market.  Anything could happen in China.  We are lucky, we sell globally. When I started, it was the Middle Eastern buyers, then the Japanese, then the Russians, and now the Chinese.  To be strong in China, you need to be strong in Europe.  You have to remember that.  They come to Europe to see what is strong then go back to China to buy.“

To estimate the fortune of Philippe Stern & family, FORBES compared the company’s figures to public traded companies such as Swatch and Richemont  Representatives of the company confirmed that Patek Philippe is still 100% owned by the Stern family. FORBES estimates that Philippe Stern, who was named after the watch, and his family, including son Thierry Stern who is the current president of the company, have a net worth of around $3 billion. The company refused to comment on the family's net worth.

Philippe Stern, son of Henri, brought the company into the modern age with the introduction of Caliber89, known as ‘the most complicated watch in the world’, a commemorative pocket watch created in 1989 to celebrate the company’s 150th anniversary. As the third generation to run the family business, Philippe was appointed Managing Director in 1977, became president in 1993 and took over the company upon his father's death in 2002.

Philippe innovated by launching the leading-edge production workshop in Plan-les-Ouates in 1996, then the Patek Philippe Museum in 2001, a “temple to watchmaking” located in a restored Art Deco building, which one Geneva website describes as “probably the most popular museum in Geneva.” In 2009, to fight counterfeiting, Philippe Stern backed the launch of the Patek Philippe Seal, an exclusive quality standard to ensure the perennial value of Patek Philippe timepieces.

Thierry Stern, Philippe's son, born in 1970, joined Patek Philippe in 1990. He spent time working in the company's New York City mail room while learning the trade from the ground up. In 2009, Thierry took over as the President of Patek Philippe when he was 39 years old. Philippe Stern remains on the board as honorary president and reportedly plans to keep the company in the family.  Thierry and his father Philippe Stern have affirmed a number of times to different publications that “The first and most important thing is to stay independent.” The market expects that the company that is celebrating its 175th anniversary in May will remain fully controlled by the billionaire Stern family for a long time.

With reporting from Zainab Amin. 

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