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Literature on the LIP company is scarce and any that does exist is usually in French. However,
Nick Downes wrote a very good summary for Timezone back in 2002 and, with his permission, I reproduce
the orginal article under the "History" link on the lefthand side.
As far as their electric watches are concerned, LIP produced the world's second electric movement,
the R 27, in 1958. It was, however, the world's first "electronic" movement because it contained a tiny
diode to reduce sparking on the contacts; it was a bulky unit and required two batteries.
Approximately 7000 units were made and it quite hard to find today --- I was lucky enough to get my
very nice example in 2007.
In September 1962, the R 148 appeared; it was a great improvement over the R 27, being easy to service
and only requiring a single battery. The R 148 and R 184 were very similar, the latter being the
first electric watch with a date.
LIP are also well known for their association with the designer Roger Tallon. The R 148 / R 184 appeared
in several of his case designs. The ladies LIP movement, R 50, was also used in a Roger Tallon designed
case. All the genuine Roger Tallon designed watches from the 1960s now fetch relatively huge sums of money. They
have all become very collectible.
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