Biel/Bienne

 commune - administrative division, third-level administrative division

Biel (German)/ Bienne (French) is a city in the Biel/Bienne administrative district in the canton of Bern in Switzerland. It has a population of about 50'000 of which roughly two thirds speak German, about one third French. The town is officially bilingual and is the biggest bilingual town in Switzerland.

The city lies at the foot of the first mountain range of the Jura Mountains area (guarding the only practical connection to Jura in the area) on the northeastern shores of Lake Biel (Bielersee, Lac de Bienne), sharing the eastern tip of the lake with its sister city, Nidau. Neuchâtel, Solothurn, and Bern (the capital of Switzerland) lie west, east and southeast of Biel/Bienne. They all can be reached in about 30 minutes, either by train or by car.

The city and its neighbourhood thrive on precision and micro mechanics, the conception and manufacture of highly-specialised, production-oriented machinery and tools. The products are exported worldwide, next to Swiss-made watches of the well known and reputed watch brands located in the city and its vicinity. Among them: Rolex (movement and technical parts production), Omega and Swatch, as well as the headquarters of the Swatch Group, the biggest watch-manufacturing company in the world.