Squale

Squale is a Swiss watch brand that specializes in dive watches. Charles von Büren, who had been assembling watches under his own name since 1948, registered the Squale trademark in Neuchâtel in 1959; squale is French for shark. The brand is now owned by the Maggi family, formerly its Italian distributors, and has been headquartered in Chiasso, Switzerland, since 2020.

In the 1960s and 1970s Squale was largely a case supplier. It made dive cases for many other brands, including 500 m cases with a 4 o'clock crown sold to Blancpain, Heuer and Doxa, and it also supplied watches to Italian military units such as the Navy's diving corps. Squale began selling under its own name as an independent company in 1974, switched to quartz in 1989 after the quartz crisis, and relaunched in 2010. Freediver Jacques Mayol wore Squale watches during several of his record dives.