looking in when it comes to the (Swiss) watch industry. That said they were toiling away making beautiful watches that had a Japanese sensibility.
I think they would have liked to have taken over the market thru manufacturing watches. They managed to succeed in spite of that.
I do think the earlier designs coming out of Seiko reflected more of the cultural influence of Japan. Looking at the success of Rolex, I think Seiko committed to a line of case design that it thought could directly compete with. While that makes good business sense it did limit their ability to experiment as they once did.