Market Movers. A bet on quartz, a chain of showrooms and, finally, a calibre of its own.
Titan began as an idea Xerxes Desai had in 1977, when he looked at an Indian market dominated by the state-owned HMT. It took until July 1984 for Titan Watches to be set up as a joint venture between the Tatas and the Tamil Nadu Industrial Development Corporation, and another three years for the first watch to reach shops.
The idea
Desai and his team made a decision that set Titan’s course: quartz was the future, not mechanical. The factory in Hosur, Tamil Nadu, was built for quartz analogue watches, and its location close to Bengaluru, where HMT’s own watch plant stood, was deliberate. Getting there meant working through HMT’s dominance, Swiss reluctance to share technology, licensing rules and foreign-exchange limits.
The early models
Titan reached the market in 1987 with five collections: Exacta in steel, Classique with gold-plated dials and leather straps, Spectra in two-tone, Royale with gold-plated bracelets and a sporty line for younger buyers. The Hosur factory was inaugurated by JRD Tata on 11 March 1988. By its first year, 1987 to 1988, Titan had become India’s leading producer of quartz analogue watches.
How customers reacted
The start was modest. On 23 December 1987 the first Titan showroom opened at Safina Plaza in Bengaluru and sold 17 watches on its first day, then 313 in the first month. Convincing buyers to trust a battery-powered watch needed education, and Titan paired it with well-lit, exclusive showrooms, which was new for watch retail in India. One story from the Titan book Time Is Money has a quartz watch gifted to JRD Tata failing to work, to the embarrassment of the team.
How it evolved
Titan became Titan Industries in 1993 as it moved into other products, launched Sonata and Fastrack to reach cheaper and younger buyers, and opened the Helios multi-brand luxury store format in 2009. Its engineering ambition showed in the Edge of 2002, a 3.65 mm watch it called the slimmest in the world. It began work on its own mechanical movements in 2011 and launched the Edge Mechanical in 2021 as India’s slimmest mechanical watch.
On 18 September 2026 Titan launched Vetra, a branded in-house mechanical movement built at its Hosur facility. The 7A series powers the Titan Automatics collection at ₹47,995 to ₹54,995, in four editions called Infinium, Dualis, Midnite and Atrium.
Why it matters: few watch companies in the world run from mass-market quartz through retail to a movement of their own. The story of Vetra is the story of Titan’s 40 years in one line.
Key facts
| Idea | Xerxes Desai, 1977 |
| Founded | Titan Watches, July 1984; Tata and TIDCO joint venture |
| First collections | 1987 |
| First showroom | Safina Plaza, Bengaluru, 23 December 1987; 17 watches on day one |
| Hosur factory | Inaugurated 11 March 1988 by JRD Tata |
| Edge | 2002, 3.65 mm |
| Edge Mechanical | 2021 |
| Vetra | 18 September 2026; 7A series |
Sources: Tata.com, “40 years of Titan”; Titan’s heritage page; The Better India; Penguin India’s Time Is Money; Wikipedia’s Titan Company entry; Chronoholic, Deccan Herald and MediaBrief on Vetra. Images: Titan, via Chronoholic; no media kit was available to us.
