Charles Berner

Charles Berner (1892-1951) was a watchmaker best known as the founder of the Fabrique d'Ebauches de Peseux.

Coming from a family of distinguished watchmakers, Charles Berner was born in 1892. The son of La Chaux-de-Fonds watchmaking professor Paul Berner (1858-1942), Charles Berner studied watchmaking there at the technical.

In 1912, Charles Berner began his working life, applying new manufacturing techniques at the Cortébert factory until 1916. From 1916 to 1920, Berner worked in Bienne at the Omega factory. In 1920, Berner left Omega to focus on the manufacture of ebauches, collaborating in the creation of the Fabrique d'Ebauches de Fleurier for the next three and a half years.

Having learned what he could about manufacturing, Charles Berner founded his own ebauche factory in Peseux in 1923 in a building previously used by the Sandoz watch company. The Fabrique d'Ebauches de Peseux would join the Fleurier factory in Ebauches SA in 1932 and would be merged with it and others under FHF in 1979.

As Ebauches SA began taking over ebauche factories, Charles Berner began working with the cartel. In late 1932 he merged his Peseux operation with the rest and served for 19 years at Ebauches SA as well as in watchmaking organizations.

He suffered a heart attack in August 1949 from which he never truly recovered, passing away on January 9, 1951. First, though, he turned management of the Peseux factory over to his son Francis Berner and Ebauches SA management.