
Our team had a simple question when we started. Why couldn't India put a watch on the world stage and mean it?
A real watch, built to real specifications, for people who treat time as something to be earned rather than spent. That question is what became our first collection: five lines, each designed around a different way of moving through the world. Every piece runs on either our proprietary Q-MATIC system, sits behind a sapphire crystal, and is built from 316L surgical-grade stainless steel. Every single watch is individually numbered. We made 2,100 pieces for our debut, available only by request.
Watchmaking at Rotoris is led by Harman Wadhwa, India's only formally Swiss-educated watchmaker. We say that not to impress, but because it tells you the standard we held ourselves to from day one.
The four men in this piece didn't sign up to wear our watches. Each of them looked at what we made and recognised something in it. That's a different thing entirely. Here's the full story.
01 - Kush Maini. F2 Driver
His Watch: Astonia Sports Watch Chronograph 'Phantom Black' Collection: Astonia, Case: 42mm matte black 316L stainless steel Movement: Q-MATIC Bezel: Tachymetre Crystal: Sapphire Strap: FKM rubber
F2 Racing Driver and Alpine F1 Reserve Driver
In March 2026, at the Australian Grand Prix in Melbourne, Kush Maini walked through the Formula 1 paddock at Albert Park wearing the Astonia Sports Chronograph in Phantom Black. It was the first time an Indian watch had ever appeared at an F1 grid.
Kush Maini is an Alpine Academy driver, a Formula 1 Reserve Driver, and one of India's most serious motorsport exports. He has spent the better part of a decade moving up through Formula 4, Formula 3, and Formula 2 in a sport that has historically not made it easy for drivers who don't come with the full weight of a European establishment behind them.
We designed the Astonia around the instruments of precision measurement. The tachymetre bezel calculates speed from elapsed time, a staple of motorsport chronographs for decades. The Q-MATIC movement delivers the accuracy of quartz with the sweeping seconds hand and tactile pushers of a mechanical chronograph. The 42mm matte black case and FKM rubber strap make no concessions to delicacy. This is a watch for someone whose environment demands that things hold up.
02 - Tanmay Bhat Comedian, Creator and Investor
His watch: Astonia Watch 'Stealth Silver' Collection: Astonia. Case: 316L surgical-grade stainless steel Movement: Q-MATIC Crystal: Sapphire Finish: Stealth silver dial Edition
Before the first Rotoris Watches we ever shipped, Tanmay Bhat believed in what we were building. He came in as an investor during our seed round, alongside Nikhil Kamath and Vivek Oberoi.
Tanmay Bhat has spent over a decade reshaping Indian comedy and content. He co-founded one of its most influential creative collectives, built a digital audience before that was a conventional career path, stepped away when he needed to, and came back sharper and more himself than before. His career has never followed a safe line. It has followed his judgment. Again and again, that judgment turned out to be right.
The Stealth Silver is the most versatile expression in our Astonia line. Same Q-MATIC movement, same sapphire crystal, same surgical-grade steel as the rest of the collection. For someone who moves between a podcast studio, a board room, and a comedy gig on the same Tuesday, that adaptability isn't incidental.
03 - Suyash Kesari Photographer
His watch: Auriqua Watch 'Ocean Blue' Case: 42mm 316L stainless steel | Movement: Automatic, 25-jewel calibre | Crystal: Sapphire | Design language: Yacht-inspired
The Auriqua is the most technically ambitious piece in our debut lineup. It runs on a fully automatic 25-jewel movement wound entirely by the motion of the wrist. No battery, no compromise. We designed it around the language of nautical instruments, for people who read changing conditions, make decisions without a clear map, and find their own line through open water.
Suyash Kesari has spent his career doing exactly that, not with a pool or a finish line, but with a lens. Photography at its most serious is an act of navigation. You read light before it shifts, anticipate a moment before it exists, and commit to a frame in a fraction of a second with no guarantee of what you'll find when you look at it later. Suyash has built a body of work on exactly that kind of instinct, images that feel less like they were taken and more like they were waiting for.
The Ocean Blue dial uses depth and colour to suggest something larger than itself. It doesn't sit quietly on the wrist. It pulls your eye the way a great photograph does. You're not sure exactly why you can't look away, only that something in it is true.
04 - Sumit Nagal, Professional Tennis Player, ATP Tour
His watch: Astonia Sports Watch 'Circuit Blue' Case: 316L surgical-grade stainless steel Movement: Q-MATIC meca-quartz Crystal: Sapphire Dial: Circuit Blue Edition
Sumit Nagal became the first Indian man in over a decade to win a match at the US Open. He did it on one of the loudest courts in world tennis, against a higher-ranked opponent, in front of a crowd that largely had no idea who he was. He won anyway. That sentence summarises his career better than most paragraphs could.
Competing on the ATP Tour as an Indian player, without the institutional backing or the financial cushion that players from established tennis nations take as a given, is a specific kind of grind. Sumit has navigated injuries, ranking setbacks, and the logistical weight of competing across continents year after year. He has never become the kind of player who reaches for excuses. He earns each point. He always has.
The Circuit Blue sits on his wrist the way his ranking sits in the world. Earned, not given. Built over time. Defended every week.
Kush wore the Phantom Black at an F1 grid because its tachymetre and chronograph are built from the same instruments his world runs on. Tanmay invested in us because he recognised something true in what we were trying to build. Suyash wears the Auriqua because his entire life has been an act of navigating conditions that weren't built for him. Sumit wears the Circuit Blue because he has spent a decade on the actual circuit, earning every position he holds.
Every piece we make is individually numbered. You don't just own a Rotoris Watch. You own a specific one, with your number, in a limited run, made to specifications we refused to compromise on.
That is the only kind of choice we are interested in. The deliberate kind. The kind that winners make.