Meet Quinn Lai: The Man Behind The First Certified “Made In Hong Kong” Mechanical Movement

Quinn Lai, the Hong Kong-based founder of EONIQ watches, has a talent for building brands that reflect his ethos and passion. Introduced to the world of watches through a gift from his father, the parallel entrepreneur has fused his passion for horology with his engineering background. Lai has devoted himself to the creation of watches that are not just aesthetically pleasing but also functional, with a focus on customization, craftsmanship and timeless designs.

To know more about Lai’s innovative approach to watchmaking and his vision for EONIQ, we visited his store and workshop at The Mills in Hong Kong.

Excerpts from the interview:

What sparked your interest in watches?

When I was in high school, my dad gifted me a kinetic Seiko watch, which I didn't appreciate at the time. I lost the watch later and that's when I started to like it. "So, it's like after you lose something, you realize how cool it was, and you start thinking, 'Dude, how can I get it back?' Unfortunately, I could never find that watch again to buy it back. That's how I started wanting a watch, not necessarily for logical reasons. I then started reading about them online. I found it interesting how mechanical watches get harder to wind as you wind them, but they don't speed up. This piqued my curiosity, but I never really got an answer to my questions.

Later, in college, I studied engineering, and I had some free time to explore my interest in watches. I went on eBay in 2007 and found some components to try and put together my first watch, with a ETA/UNITAS 6497 movement. I got a compatible case, dial, and watch hands to assemble it. This experience made me want to study prototyping, so I shifted my focus there. Eventually, I went to design school at Stanford because I wanted to create things out of my imagination, one piece at a time.

I started making my own dials and assembling my own watches. My friends started to ask me for help with some of their gifts, and I eventually did it as a hobby, assembling watches part-time on weekends. After four or five years, the watches I assembled started to go up in retail price, and I realized this could be a business.

Are there any watchmaking icons or legends who have influenced your work?

No, back then, I was just looking at watchmaking like putting together Legos. It was more about figuring out the frequencies, gear ratios, power reserves, and the working of the powertrain. I was more interested in those technical specs than the craft itself. One name comes to mind, Johannes Kallinich, who is now an independent watchmaker. While most people start their first project with a 6497 movement and then modify it to create their own, he is the type of person who creates something entirely from scratch, like a CNC machine.

What motivated you to establish EONIQ watches, particularly in Hong Kong?

I have a tendency to gravitate towards entrepreneurship. I started my own business when I was 14, getting my friends to tutor people and collecting a margin. After my consulting job, I was in Hong Kong, and at the time, there was a social movement known as the “Umbrella Movement.” I noticed that many young people lacked hope, and I felt that with my international training and experience, I could do something locally. I wanted to start a business that was best done in Hong Kong, rather than going to Silicon Valley. I went through all the business models I had written down in my notebook and thought about what would be best for Hong Kong and its young designers and craftsmen. Combining traditional craftsmanship and watchmaking with a bit of tech always seemed interesting to me. My background in tech startups from Silicon Valley gave me some ideas. That's where the original idea of creating EONIQ came from. Over time, it evolved into what it is today.

What obstacles did you face while starting a watch brand outside of Switzerland, the epicenter of watchmaking?

I would say that creating a watch business in Hong Kong is probably easier, but creating your own mechanical movement is super difficult. Let me explain why it's easier to create a watch brand here first. At one point in Hong Kong, you could go to the Watch & Clock fair held every year and walk from one end to the other in Hall A to find everything from watches to packaging. You just need to think of a brand and stick it on top. I don't want to downplay anyone's effort in creating a brand. While there aren't too many places where you can do this, Hong Kong is one of them. For a small brand, Hong Kong is still a very good place to start a watch brand, especially now that COVID restrictions are easing. If you want to create your own mechanical watch movement, that's a different story. I had to make sure that the entry-level cost was below a certain amount because anything above that would require additional checks. We had some experience in creating custom components, but we couldn't CNC individual main plates if we wanted to keep the cost under $800 USD.

What distinguishes EONIQ from other watch brands in the global market?

Well, I tried to create something timeless. I didn't aim to create a collector's interpretation of a legendary design or a fashion watch that would be a big hit for a certain period. I haven't attempted that because those are where the big fast monies lie. While starting EONIQ initially, we knew that it's unreasonable. I believe this is the difference between our brand and others; our values are more non-monetary. Different people value different things. I wouldn't say you could sell this for 10 times the price after two years.The same applies to the "Made in Hong Kong" movement. For some collectors, it's definitely worth more than the MSRP we're selling it at.

What are your key releases this year?

I will be focusing on EONIQ Signature, our slightly higher-scale brand. “The Braemar,” which we soft-launched last December, has started selling more this year. It's the first watch with the calibre 852 (Hong Kong’s telephone dialing code), featuring a very classic dress watch design that is skeletonized. It comes in two sizes, 38.5 and 32.5, and runs on a manual mechanical movement. We designed a lot of ratios, such as the steps on the side and the body profile line that cuts through the crown, to achieve this look at this price point. This is our first model, and the next one coming up is an integrated bracelet version of a watch with the calibre 852. We don't have a name for it yet, but we expect to launch it either later this year or in Q1 next year.

Which watches do you have your in your personal collection?

I have a couple of Seikos, and I don't want to say they're cheap, but they are. I find some of their references very interesting, especially when I buy them in the places I've visited. For example, when I was in Japan, I bought a Seiko watch that reminds me of the place. Similarly, when I visited Paris, I managed to get an appointment in the Baltic showroom and bought a watch that I find very interesting. I had the opportunity to talk to one of their core team members and learn about their process. I find their story inspiring, and I think the watch is unique, even though it's not as popular as some of their other models. I also have a couple of Longines. One of them is the Big Eye Pilot, which I bought because of its story. The watch was taken back to Longines by its owner, and Longines didn't even know it existed. They had to look into their archives to find out more about it, and it was supposedly an experiment. I find the story fascinating, and that's why I like the watch.

Customization is a significant aspect of your brand's business model. Tell us more about it?

I'm not sure why, but being in Hong Kong makes us very different from the rest. One reason could be our workshops, where people can come and learn about printing on watch dials with the help of a pad printer. It's the hands-on experience of putting watches together, printing one's own watch, and assembling it that makes EONIQ unique. We had one customer who came in at 11 a.m. and left at 8 p.m. after going through the entire process of printing her own watch face, flame-blowing the watch hands and assembling the entire watch. I remember she wanted a Game of Thrones character on that watch. It's something that I will always remember because we taught her how to do it and walked her through the entire process, even during our lunch break.

We understand EONIQ is not your only venture, could you tell us about your other companies and how they have influenced EONIQ watches?

In a way, EONIQ has given birth to my other ventures. We started with custom watches, where people design them and we make them. After making them, we realized that we were doing things differently from everyone else who claimed to have custom watches. So we started workshops, which completely outshone the competitors. We have the craft and capability to make custom watches that are unique and beautiful. We found that people can appreciate the craft with just a few hours on the weekend, without needing to travel to Switzerland to learn about watchmaking. We give them the experience and they understand the beauty of a clean dial with blue-d hands. We then thought, can we bring this experience to more people? That's when we created the DIY watch club, where we package the whole assembly experience and ship it to people. We already had the mindset of moving some of our experiences, such as pad printing, but it's heavy and difficult to ship, so we're still figuring out ways to do it. We're already doing flame bluing, and we have a kit that we sell for people to blue their watch hands at home and put them into their own watches. Playing with lume powder is also fun, especially for dive watches. We're essentially bringing the appreciation and enjoyment of a bespoke mechanical watch to people who originally didn't know much about watches.

What's next for EONIQ?

I'm not going to sugarcoat it — I'm not very optimistic about micro brands in the next three to five years. Despite our current performance, I'm uncertain about investing in new designs and products. While I originally wanted to create a new complication for the movement, I'm not sure if it's feasible at this point. Instead, we're focusing on optimizing our existing designs and processes to improve our products. We're still launching the integrated bracelet version at the end of this year, and on the DIY watch club side, we're bringing more crafts to more people, including movement kits, chronographs, and anti-magnetic cages. We're also getting more lume powders for those who find it relevant. Our mission is to spread the craft of watchmaking to more people and provide them with a unique experience.