Editor’s Note
**Editor’s Note:** Gernot Langes-Swarovski, the great-grandson of Swarovski’s founder, has died at 77 after a long illness. He led the company for 35 years, transforming it into a global brand.
Gernot Langes-Swarovski, the great-grandson of the founder of the renowned jewelry brand Swarovski, has died at the age of 77. The company announced that he passed away “after a long battle with a serious illness and in the presence of his closest loved ones.” He had been ill for some time.
Langes-Swarovski served as managing partner of the company for 35 years, transforming the family business into a global brand. Under his leadership, the company, originally based in Wattens, Tyrol, became a multinational recognized worldwide. He was one of Austria’s most successful entrepreneurs.
The founder and inventor of the distinctive crystal was Daniel Swarovski, born in Bohemia in 1862. His crystal composition is made of glass and lead (about 30%), but the exact formula is jealously guarded as an industrial secret. Daniel Swarovski, a glass cutter and jeweler active in Switzerland but originally from Bohemia, patented a cutting machine in 1892, increasing the production and processing of crystals. In 1895, Swarovski, financier Armand Kosmann, and Franz Weis founded the Swarovski company, originally known as A. Kosmann, Daniel Swarovski & Co., later abbreviated as K.S. & Co.
Thanks to Gernot Langes-Swarovski, the company opened its first store in London in the early 1980s, and today it is represented in 170 countries. Born in Wattens, Tyrol, on October 13, 1943, he led the company for over three decades, contributing significantly to its success. He joined the company very young, in the mid-1960s, as a limited partner and later as CEO.
In 1974, when the company faced a drastic drop in sales following the oil price shock, Gernot Langes-Swarovski took over the management of the family business alongside Christian Schwemberger-Swarovski and brothers Helmut and Gerhard Swarovski.
Four years later, with Christian Schwemberger-Swarovski, he acquired Aircraft Innsbruck, which later became Tyrolean Airways (now part of the Austrian Airlines Group), while today’s Tyrolean Jet Services was spun off from the company and has been solely owned by Swarovski since 1988.
In 1995, under his guidance, the Museum Kristallwelten (Crystal Worlds) was inaugurated in Wattens. Gernot was awarded various honors. In 2002, he handed over his functions in the group—sales and marketing—to his son Markus. He had been retired from public life for some time.