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Though he claims to chafe when his competitors make cracks about his "rug merchant" bargaining methods and his "Mediterranean" temperament, Hayek nonetheless displays what he describes as "an exaggerated amount of self- confidence. I want to look in my mirror every morning and say, 'You're great.' " His strength as a businessman, Hayek says, is that he has retained "the fantasy of a six-year-old child. If you can keep and use the curiosity of a child, you can only improve everything around you." He describes his talent as being able to spot new ways of selling "emotional" products. "An emotional product is something you can love," says Hayek, "something you are involved with -- the watch on your wrist, the telephone in your hand, the car you drive. It's not the same with washing machines."
Hayek, who is personally worth more than $1 billion, is passionate about his playtime too. He is a fervent tennis player and skier, owns two vacation homes in southern France, collects art (a Dali melted-watch sculpture graces his office), adores classical music, Cuban cigars and good food. "I'm a sensual kind of guy. I drink life fully," he says.
But some say his hunger for life has an unattractive side; it makes him unreasonable or just plain self-aggrandizing. "He has the qualities and defects of a child," says SMH engineer Jacques Muller, who actually designed the Swatch. "He thinks everything is possible. Unfortunately, everything is | not always possible." Says Hayek's rival and ex-deputy Dr. Ernst Thomke, who claims to have originated the Swatch concept in 1979: "He has to be the big boss, alone, and can never share opinions. He was a consultant all his life, and he wanted to become a marketer and product developer. But he never learned that job. That's why he's so keen on promoting this ridiculous idea of a car."
So far, SMH has sunk about $18.9 million into the project, betting that advanced microtechnologies developed in the watch industry can be translated into innovative designs for a car's propulsion and electrical systems. "We're not trying to build some little gadget here," Hayek said on a private tour of the garage last December. "We want to have a consumer product that you can produce and use in the millions."
Although Hayek has landed a blue-chip partner, he continues to inspire skepticism. A short-lived joint venture with Volkswagen broke down last year. "I have trouble believing in this project," says Paris-based market analyst Antoine Nodet. "Jumping from watches to cars lacks credibility." Jean-Marc Buchet, who follows the auto industry for the French brokerage firm Leven, says that "there is clearly a market for a small city car" but wonders if people will pay $10,000 for "a two-seater with no trunk space."
Others are more sanguine. General Motors president Jack Smith, who had lunch with Hayek in Biel in December, calls the Swatchmobile "interesting" and says of Hayek: "He's for real." Roland Leutenegger, an analyst at the Zurich-based Bank Julius Maer, argues that Mercedes' automaking know-how and Hayek's marketing genius will make a winning combination. "The right partners have found each other," he says. For Hayek, predictably, the future of the Swatchmobile is assured. "I'm not a dreamer. I've proved all my life that I'm a down-to-earth guy. We can make this car. Believe me." Some people apparently do: he has already received 35,000 orders.