Rolex
Rolex SA () is a Swiss luxury watchmaker. Originally founded as "Wilsdorf and Davis" by Hans Wilsdorf and Alfred Davis in London in 1905, the company registered "Rolex" as the brand name of its watches in 1908. In 1919, the company moved its base of operations to Geneva, Switzerland in order to avoid heavy taxation from a recovering post-war Britain, and "Montres Rolex S.A." was registered as the new company name by Hans Wilsdorf in Geneva in 1920. Since 1960, the company has been owned by the Hans Wilsdorf Foundation, a private family trust.
Rolex Sea Dweller
The Rolex Oyster Perpetual Sea-Dweller Submariner 2000 with reference number 1665 was originally developed in 1967 but became available to the public only in 1971. This delay was probably caused by issues with obtaining the patent for the helium escape valve. The Rolex helium valve was the idea of Robert A. Barth, a US Navy diver who pioneered saturation diving during the US Navy Genesis and SEALAB missions led by Dr. George F. Bond. In the past, it was wrongly assumed the Sea-Dweller was developed in cooperation with Comex S.A. industrial deep-sea diving but the french company became a partner of Rolex only in late 1971. The first version of the Sea-Dweller was the so-called "Single Red" with a depth rating of . Most of these watches were awarded to pioneers in underwater exploration like Robert Palmer Bradley, who was a pilot of Deepstar 4000. Later versions had an increased depth rating of .