Who would have said that the Seiko Astron was going to be that successful? It looks like yesterday but it actually happened in 2013, when the Astron first appeared on Horbiter®’s pages and here it is again in its tenth version and witnessing Horbitech‘s birth; the same way the first Seiko Astron in the series graced the front pages of a new blog that is now about to become a media channel.

Besides, think about it for a moment; do you think that such a big manufacturing company like Seiko is would have invested so much energy and money to accomplish something that would only last a season or a little longer than that?

Certainly not, but nobody, including myself, would have thought that the Seiko Astron GPS Solar would become the product of such a large collection that is now a trademark by itself, a product philosophy that is separated from the rest of the range.

The Japanese, world leaders when it comes to digital technology in the radio–controlled and GPS technology sectors, have come up with yet another version of their Astron GPS.

They have also managed to create a link with mechanical watch-making, of which Seiko is a co-protagonist, because within the Seiko Astron GPS Solar Big Date lies the very best example of those complications that are typical of mechanical timepieces; the Big Date that somehow reminds us of the brand’s Premier men’s collection, the Kinetic technology, and the 7D56 reference that is equipped with the exact same window with the very same font and the same complication in that position.

If you want to find out what our readers said in the past about the Seiko Astron GPS Solar, I would recommend your reading of our dedicated articles on Horbiter®. I am talking in the reverse order about the Astron GPS Solar Chronograph, the Seiko Astron GPS Solar Stratosphere or even about the July 2013 first published article about Seiko an all-encompassing article about what Seiko presented in Basel that specific year.

From today onwards, Horbitech is officially the home of the Astron GPS, not a smartwatch, but rather a collection that combines the digital mission of this new channel. Chronograph, Dual Time, World–Time and Big Date; these are the four macro collections of the Seiko Astron GPS Solar Big Date; here you can find it in its version dedicated to the European ambassador of the brand; the great tennis player Novak Djokovic, who – in his role as a sports globe-trotter – uses this timepiece more often than even the most rigorous executive of a multinational enterprise.

A new caliber, the 8X42, enters the family of the Seiko Astron timepieces. This is a watch that is famous for its unique feature; a mini-antenna located under the ceramic bezel that receives its signal from GPS satellites and that automatically adjusts its hands so as to get the local time of the city where you have just landed. A more classical and elegant aesthetic style if compared to the first Astron timepieces, a style that brings to this collection, and thus to its European customers, some typical characteristics of those Brightz watches that are sold exclusively on the domestic Japanese market.

The Seiko Astron GPS Solar Big Date Novak Djokovic Limited Edition features a steel-made case with a Black Hard coating, on the bezel are engraved the names of the cities corresponding to the earth’s different time zones, where the four cities indicating the Grand Slam tournaments – that Nole won one after the other in 2016 – are painted in yellow, probably as a reference to the color of a tennis ball.

The Seiko Astron GPS Solar Big Date Novak Djokovic Limited Edition is 45.5mm large and 13mm thick, the small components of the Dual–Time display the four game scores (Love, 15′, 30′ and 45′). Among the other basic technical features of the SSE143 reference are a resistance to magnetic fields of up to 4800 A/m and a precision rate of one second each 100,000 years. This timepiece is definitely a great mixture of miniaturized technology in a limited edition and it retails at a price of 2,150 euro. Do you think there is anything else to add to that?

(Photo credit: Horbiter®)

Gaetano C @gaetano