JLC launches the Or Déco collection

Saturday, 30 May 2026

Jaeger Lecoultre used the Reverso exhibition in Miami to announce the Or Déco collection - 5 new watches in gold expanding last year’s well received Tribute Small Second rose gold (ref. Q713216J). Fratello has a good overview of the launch on their site.

As it sits, the collection now offers a white gold variant of the original, three models with gems (2 white gold, 1 rose gold) called Or Déco cocktail, and a simpler, smaller model without the small second at 6 o'clock called the Or Déco Solo Tempo available in rose gold only. For those unaware, ‘or’ is French for gold and the material is indeed the star of these models. The gem models are limited runs (30 each), a common approach for this kind of price bracket (which is not disclosed but certainly runs in the 6 digits). The Solo Tempo is a permanent reference.

I’m not close enough to JLC to know for sure if the original model, launched at last year’s Watches and Wonders, was meant as a one-off project or if there was already an entire potential range in the works. Either way, it’s clear that Jérôme Lambert can recognize a success when he sees one and he did the logical thing: build on top of it.

The finely grained dials and elegant Milanese bracelet continue to look gorgeous in white gold. It’s a nice alternative for those who appreciate the originality of the model, but would rather go for something slightly more understated.

While the original pink gold Tribute was not launched at Watches and Wonder under the ‘ Or Déco’ branding, an interview of Lambert in July 2025 with Fratello already mentioned it: One imagines that the reception on those first few months must have been good enough for management to start planning an extension 8 months later.

The addition of a Solo Tempo model (a new branding that may be used for other variations in the same case size for future new Tribute models?) is derived from the original smaller-size ref. Q713216J launched in September 2024. It makes for a nice entry point for those keen on a smaller case (or preferring the original 1930s dimensions) or a more affordable option, even if in this instance the price difference seems modest (roughly 10% - 36’500 CHF instead of 40,300). JLC seems to now make a point of offering an entry point to their core ranges with a smaller, more affordable reference : Reverso started the trend with ref. Q713216J in late 2024, Master Control introduced a limited edition 36mm model in late 2025 (ref. Q4008520, limited to 500 pieces), and recently Polaris soft-launched a 40mm model (ref Q9128981).

Speaking of more affordable entry point, there’s no stainless steel model - probably both for practical and strategic reasons. The whole point of the range is the sophisticated Milanese bracelet which seems complex to construct - I believe Lambert recently commented construction costs on a stainless steal version would simply not make sense commercially. I also suspect that JLC is happy to meet success of this kind with a gold reference and may not want to dilute this with a stainless steal model if they want to continue to rise their average selling point or elevate their positioning towards Vacheron, Länge and Patek. Those wanting the Tribute aesthetics in stainless steel in a nice monochrome vibe can turn to the existing Tribute Monoface we just mentioned, or its full-sized Q3908410 duo-face sibling with a white opaline dial.

On the whole the Or Déco is a nice success story for JLC - it’s gotten some nice exposure for the brand and adds to the Tribute sub-range, just like JLC seems to have pursued in its quest to move upward in the market.

It also seems to fall squarely into Lambert’s mantra of “recognize, recognize, recognize, surprise”. This leitmotiv comes from an article that Carson Chan wrote on his website Watch Professor after meeting Lambert at Watches and Wonders this year.

One of the strongest moments in our conversation came when we discussed icons and innovations. Jaeger-LeCoultre has true icons: Reverso, Master Control, and a long history of important technical and aesthetic work. The challenge with icons is always the same. If you change too much, you risk losing the identity. If you change too little, the watch becomes static.

Lambert summarized the approach beautifully: “Recognize, recognize, recognize, surprise”

(…) An icon must first be recognizable. The DNA, the style, the technical signature - these things must remain visible. But recognition alone is not enough. Lamber was very direct about it: a dead fish is still recognizable, but it has no life. A watch canoe familiar and still fail to create desire. There has to be tension between heritage and inventiveness”

Lambert’s sentence is a bit awkward taken out of the flow of the conversation, I wish we had that on tape. But I think Chan got the gist of it anyway - the winning formula is to take a well established product, and every now and then give it a solid creative twist. Chan continues:

I also brought up the Milanese bracelet on the Reverso. Lambert agreed that it is a good example. It is surprising, not strange. The Art Deco spirit of the Reverso and the character of a mesh bracelet have certain historical and stylistic relationship: The result feels unexpected, but it also makes sense:

JLC has done Milanese bracelets before, mostly in the 60s on some dressy pieces - but last year’s unapologetically gold Reverso tribute was a real spark of originality for the collection - and it went down very well indeed.  The Or Deco collection is merely harping on that impulse. It’s good to see the brand take some creative risks with its designs, and I hope Lionel Favre and his product creation and design team will have more in store for JLC in the near future.

Richemont announces annual results, put rumors of JLC sale to sleep

Saturday, 23 May 2026

Richemont published yesterday its annual results for the financial year ending 31 March 2026. In broad strokes: the Specialist Watchmakers division did not have a great year, but things finally picked up in late 2025 and early 2026, including for JLC. Owner Johann Rupert was present and gave answers in an entertaining Q&A, including an almost 10 minute aside on JLC.

WATCH SPECIALISTS HAVE A FLAT YEAR, JLC DOES OK

Richemont announced overall sales in progress of 5%, totaling € 22.4 billion. This figure hides some of the headwinds outside of the Group’s control, in particular currency fluctuations (in constant currency exchange rates, sales growth would have reached double digit at 11%). Profit rose to € 3.5 billion, up 27% compared to the previous year. Not bad.

La Compagnie Financière Richemont is organized in 3 divisions: jewelry, watch specialists and ‘other’ (basically fashion and accessories). The jewelry business, made of (in alphabetical order) Buccellati, Cartier, Van Cleef & Arpels and Vhernier is clearly the star of the show, bringing in € 16.5 billion in sales compared to the Watch Specialists group’s 3.1 billion and the ‘Other’’s 2.7. The Jewelry Maisons had a good year, with sales progressing by 8% (14% in constant exchange rate), profit coming at € 5 billions and operating margins at a cosy 30%.

The picture is quite different for the Specialist Watchmakers group which pools Vacheron Constantin, IWC, JLC, Panerai, A. Lange & Söhne, Piaget, Roger Dubuis and Baume & Mercier. Sales were “up modestly” at € 3.1 billion. Richemont does not break down results by Maisons, but the situation seems to have been contrasted within the division with the annual report explicitly mentioning a “sequential improvement in the second half of the year for A. Lange & Söhne, Jaeger-LeCoultre and Vacheron Constantin”. The report further noted that this performance was underpinned by novelties like the Reverso Tribute models (which were at the heart of the announcements made at Watches and Wonders 2025. Looks like the Polaris novelties launched through 2025 might not had met the same success).

This rebound of activity in late 2025 and early 2026 align with Jérôme Lambert’s comment to Le Temps back in March, when he mentioned that employees at the manufacture had been back to working full time after taking some measures to reduce hours in 2024 and first half of 2025. This also seems to square with the annual Morgan Stanley report prepared with the help of Olivier Müller at LuxeConsult, which seem to indicate JLC holding steady (doing less well than Richmond’s largest Watch Specialist Vacheron Constantin, but having been able to progress sales on the back of diminishing volumes).

As the financial report comments, it’s been a challenging past 24 months for the watch industry at large, and it’s good to see JLC being among the brands benefiting from an improvement in the market. This also seems to dispel  the thesis that Richemont might consider selling JLC because of a disappointing level of performance: the brand seems to be among the “good pupils” in the Watch Specialists division.

One interesting tidbits in these results (besides serving as a reminder that the Watch Specialists are a much smaller group than the Jewelers group) is that margins have just not been good. While the Jewelry Maisons can boast operating margins of 30%, the Watch Specialist group’s margin came at 3% this year (5% in 2025). This number could hide significant disparities among brands, but at least it gives an idea of how different the landscape is for watchmakers compared to jewelers. Market-wise, the Americas was the clear source of growth (sales were up 12%), compensating in part for declines in Asia and Japan (-12% and -14%) respectively. Again, the mix for JLC could be quite little different than the rest of the Watch Specialist group, but this gives idea of the general backdrop to JLC’s encouraging rebound (and also aligns with JLC selectively closing some boutiques in China during the year).

Once the initial financial results announcement over, the meeting moved to the Q&A part, with Johann Rupert taking on most questions from the bank analysts present.

“THIS NONSENSE ABOUT JAEGER”

The 75 year old owner of Richemont is quite the character - an entrepreneur at heart, not afraid to give an honest piece of his mind to his audience if the occasion arises. The atmosphere was jovial though; with Rupert on a first name basis with most analysts in the room. I’d recommend listening to the whole segment (the video of the meeting and the written transcript are available on Richemont’s website) to get a sense of the character if you’ve never heard him. .

Things got interesting for JLC observers when Luca Solca, a Bernstein analyst, referred to the sale of Baume & Mercier announced early in 2026 and asked if other simplification was in the cards. At 1:00:35 in the recording, Luca Solca asked:

“My second question was on the perimeter. I think the market and investors saw with pleasure the simplification, the business simplification you have been bringing forward, the divestiture of Baume & Mercier. Can you tell us maybe how the other divisions' businesses are doing and if there is any further latitude and opportunity for simplification? Thank you very much.”

Rupert started his reply with Baume & Mercier, sold in January to Italian multi brand distributor Damiani:

“You know - it’s sad, because Baume was one of our very first Maisons. You know, qt times one must realize that for Baume, we are not their best owner. They need more flexibility. They need to — crudely put, they need to be able to act more “entrepreneurial”. We have very fixed cost structure and I think the new owners… Baume was always an Italian brand. It always did very very very well [in Italy]. We wish them luck! We’ve tried. And sometimes it is better that somebody else does.”

Without skipping a beat, he then turned to the other side of the question, taking it as a polite hint at the rumors that Richemont could be looking to sell JLC:

“This nonsense about Jaeger. I mean - please, how can you - who’s with UBS here? You apparently believe what you read there.”

(an analyst from UBS in the room tries to push back)

“Please - whoever says that, never trust them again. There are two or three of them or, bloggers, who really do not have a clue and are spurring nonsense. For us (points to Nicolas Bos and Burhart Grund, Richemont’s CEO and CFO sitting alongside him) this doesn’t mean a damn thing but imagine if you’re a worker at Jaeger. It’s unfair. And sooner or later somebody will actually sue them because it’s a lie. It was never discussed. In fact - you want to know how we got the whole group.”

Rupert then spent a few minutes (from the 1:03:15 mark onward) telling the story of how he took an interest in mechanical watch (Richemont already had Cartier at the time but the catalogue most mostly made of quartz watches), how the sale of Les Maisons Horlogères by VDO represented the last great opportunity to enter the market, and how he won the bid against Swatch Group after a visit to his “absolute hero” Gunter Blümlein in Schaffhausen (apprently pronounced “Shafhoose” if you want a taxi driver to accept your instruction to drive you there). Bringing his story to the conclusion he wanted to reach:

“Part of the extreme price we paid [for LMH] was for [Gunter] and then he had bone cancer. It was an absolute tragedy. But the key that he used, and I think you must all understand this, the key that he used, the expertise that he used, is Jaeger Lecoultre. And up to today, Jaeger is the watch company, the Maison, the manufacture, that can do nearly every component of a watch except maybe leather straps. They can do everything. In a sense they have helped so many other Maisons, you know, if somebody else run into trouble. So there is no way in which it would ever have been contemplated. And I am saying this to you so when you hear these stories, please, do not listen - because it’s rubbish. We’re very loyal to them, they make phenomenal watches.

[to his son Anton Rupert, a Non-executive director of Richemont sitting next to him]: I mean, what have you got on your arm Anton?

Anton Rupert: The Cardinal Points Vacheron Overseas

Johann Rupert: Okay. But that’s only because you and I cannot get the steel because we are waiting for the steel Jaeger. They made a new steel watch which is phenomenal - the new Master line, that is *spectacular.

It’s not their fault, it is our fault that we haven’t been able to explain to the rest of the world that it is. It is the watchmaker’s watchmaker. You speak to watchmakers, they look up to Jaeger. So trust me, it’s… - I won’t use the word in front of ladies - but don’t believe it.

Essentially, Rupert went into a fairly personal and emotional sidebar (calling Blümlein his hero twice) to explain that Jaeger is certainly not and has never been for sale. This, associated with the fairly good results of JLC (relative to the rest of its division) should put any rumor to rest now and for the near future.

Some thoughts ahead of Richemont’s full year results

Thursday, 21 May 2026

Back in February, luxury industry insider Miss Tweed wrote about a rumor: Jérôme Lambert might be in the process of forming a pool of investors to take JLC private from Richemont. The news got some traction on various JLC fan pages and forums - but publications like Fratello or Hodinkee chose not to amplify it. 

I see two aspects to that discussion: Richemont might be open to sell JLC, and Lambert would be leading a newly independent entity. I don’t have a crystal ball, but I think there are a few factors that make this scenario somewhat possible. 

GOING PRIVATE

In late 2024, Richemont took everyone by surprise by replacing Catherine Rénier with Jerome Lambert as CEO of Jaeger LeCoultre. These rotations are not uncommon within Richemont, but seeing a senior executive leave their position at Group level to head a brand is certainly less common.

When the rumor broke, many commentators (including the podcast I mentioned earlier this week) felt that this might be a sign Richemont think JLC has little more potential to offer. I think there’s a big to recency bias at play - Richemont had just announced it was selling its entry-level brand Baume & Mercier, in a move universally seen as removing a brand Richemont felt didn’t align with the rest of the portfolio.

Many fan de JLC feel that the recent decade has seen the brand lose some of its personality and/or rely on price increase rather than a more ambitious strategy. And so they see the news of a potential sale as confirmation that the manufacture may not be doing well.

Richemont does not break down the sale of its watch brands and reliable data remains elusive. JLC seems to have slipped a little compared to other names on the leaderboard of Morgan Stanley’s annual report on the industry and has certainly not grown at the same pace as sister brand Vacheron. But - we can also consider the trajectory of Catherine Rénier, who was JLC’s CEO from 2018 through 2024 and who left the helm of the manufacture to become CEO of Van Cleef and Arpels. Regardless of what one might think of her tenure, you usually don’t get rewarded with a leadership position in a business about thee times the size of the one you’re leaving if you did a poor job there. I suspect Rénier’s performance at the head at JLC, at least financially and compared not just to Vacheron (definitely the one good pupil of the class at the time) but the whole watch specialists portfolio, might actually have been at least satisfactory.

The other thing to consider - and I don’t mean that as a knock against other sister brands - is that if Richemont want to continue to offload brands for strategic reasons, other names like Panerai or IWC could fit that bill just as well, especially if we consider sales performance in recent years. Selling a storied name like JLC seems like an odd choice when you have other options at hand.

SHINE BRIGHT LIKE A MANUFACTURE

What might differ JLC from other candidates for a sale is its price tag, probably larger than if Richemont was to sell other accessible luxury brands in its portfolio. One reason to sell something valuable is if you need the money. Now of course, Richemont is not exactly on the verge of bankruptcy - so one rumor that has made the round is that the Group might be seeking to purchase a large independent name requiring a large amount of money. And selling JLC might be one way to secure those plans.

What name out there might be “on the market” and worth selling such a valuable manufacture as JLC? Patek and Rolex are certainly not for sale. It’s hard to imagine the Swatch group putting up for sale anything Richemont might be interested in. Zenith would not really add anything compared to JLC. Richard Mille is a nice name but seems too close to Roger Dubuis in term of target market. This leaves us with another famous name from the Vallée de Joux which, while not officially up for sale (at least as far as non-insiders know) is still mostly family owned. It’s not too difficult to imagine that some of the Audemars Piguet shareholding might be keen on cashing out on the company and feel like Richemont could be a decent steward compared to the LVMHs of the world. For Richemont, and with all due respect for JLC, trading la LeCoultre for Audemars Piguet would certainly represent a step up.

Again - I don’t have a crystal ball and the above remains pure speculation. That said, it could fit quite nicely with the choice of Lambert as a CEO at this juncture.

A WHOLE NEW ADVENTURE FOR LAMBERT?

If 2025 was fairly quiet, 2026 has been extremely active for JLC with an avalanche of novelties at Watches and Wonders - including a brand new collection put together barely within a year - some impressive new Atmos in Milan and new Reversos building on the success of last year’s Tribute Gold Small Seconds. Lambert has always had internally the reputation of someone relentlessly pushing the business forward - but he seems to really have been particularly active since his return, as if on a mission to prove the potential of the company. Turns out this could have been his mandate when he accepted to lead once again the manufacture.

At age 55 when the announcement was made, Lambert probably has (at least) a solid decade of career ahead of him. It’s entirely plausible that after having enjoyed some years at the leadership of a holding company like Richemont, Lambert could seek a more entrepreneurial challenge. Spending his final decade in his career leading an independent JLC could offer him just that, in a company he already knows inside out and helped build some 20-odd years ago.

Whether JLC could be sold to a competitor or go independent remain an open question. In a way, one could imagine that Richemont would not be too keen to put one of its most storied brands in the hands of LVMH, Swatch Group or even Partners Group (the Private Equity firm controlling Breitling). Buying an independent while ceding JLC to a pool of independent investors (including Lambert himself) feels like a more elegant scenario - even if I have no idea if Lambert actually has the means to pull off such a plan.

The good news is, Richemont will announce its annual results in just over 24 hours. Their investor call would be the perfect place for an announcement if one has been in the works over the last 18 months.

HODINKEE DISCUSSES THE REVERSO OR DECO COCKTAIL

Thursday, 14 May 2026

Hodinkee - which I can’t escape feeling has lost some of its interest in JLC since the 2017 Master Control Sector Dial - published a hands on article about the Reverso Or Deco Cocktail that was visible at the Met Gala. 

Some agreeable observations about the merits of this watch and of debuting these at the wrist of celebrities at the MET Gala. The choice of Tyriq Withers and Finn Wolfhard worked pretty well and the move allowed JLC to get a bit of press ahead of a more official launch in Miami on May 21. Well played.

The Milanese loop that garnered so much praise on last year’s rose gold model looks stunning in white gold and the finely texture white dial looks like a great pairing to create interest in close-up shots. It’s nice to see that JLC knows when it has a hit on its hands, and is not afraid of following through with further models like these elegant variations.

Mark Kauzlarich makes an interesting comment on the ‘cocktail’ denomination and how this concept brings to his mind 1920s gem extravaganza the likes of the gorgeous Reverso Secret Necklace. I see his point but tend to not always interpret marketing twist to litterally, and like that JLC kept it straightforward. What remains impressive is JLC’s ability to launch these novelties - along with the Reverso pop up exhibition in Miami - barely weeks after the avalanche of novelties (including Reversos that must have kept the gem-setting team busy) at Watches and Wonders.

W&W 2026 might have been a Master Control year, but Jérôme Lambert looks like he’s not forgetting the Reverso and is set on continuing to launch novelties at a mind-numbing pace.

Comparing the Merits of the New High Precision Guarantee Hallmark With the 1,000 Hour Control Certification

Friday, 8 May 2026

Getting the precision of your watches certified can be a great way to reassure your prospective buyers that they’re making the right choice with your product. Many brands, at certain points of their history, have made a point of getting part or all of their production certified like Rolex in the mid century or Breitling in 1999.

There are basically two ways to pursue certification :  use a well established program that is recognized as the reference on the market, or create your own “even better than the rest of the market” certification program. The advantage of the former approach is that you’re using a known brand that’s recognizable by all, giving immediate visibility and prestige to your watches. That’s what the Chronometer certification Swiss manufacturers can obtain from COSC offers. The benefit of the later approach on the other hand is your total control of the testing bench, and the possibility to design and promote it as even more stringent than other programs. It allows a shot at aiming for even more differentiation by using your own proprietary test.

JLC chose that later path in 1992 when it launched the 1000 hours control certification along with its modern day platform for round watches, the Master Control. The certification gave something to talk about and establish firmly in the landscape what was a new phase in JLC’s turnaround.

The 1000 hour control was presented at the time as a more thorough testing bench than “the standard test conducted over 15 days at the Neufchâtel Observatory”. JLC boasted: 1000 hours of testing in 6 positions, under various temperatures, while submitting the assembled watch (not just the caliber) to some harsh moves and under significant magnetic fields. And just to put a fine point on it, JLC explained that each watch passing the test received a gold seal on its caseback and the “Master controller” in charge of validating the final result get to appose their signature inside the case of the watch. In substance, the intent was to go above and beyond standard COSC certification - and let there be known to the entire market.

DUAL CERTIFICATION

Fast forward to Watches and Wonders 2026, JLC is following the same playbook while launching the Master Chronometer - except this time, the manufacture is going with COSC testing. Quite the reversal! The benefit is obvious: JLC can call the new collection the Master Control Chronometer, setting it immediately appart from the rest of the Master Control family and giving a clear concept to the watches. But rather than leave it at that and risk the change being perceived as a downgrade, JLC went for a dual certification, reviving its High Precision Guarantee (HPG) hallmark (1). This led some commenters to wonder if this certification  is better - or lesser - than the 1,000 hour control test bench it is replacing.

JLC explains this approach under the header “A renewed commitment to precision and reliability in watchmaking”, introducing at length the new HPG in those terms :

The HPG hallmark is based on a comprehensive assessment, during which each watch is subjected to demanding conditions designed to replicate the rigours of everyday life. Our patent-pending protocol allows performance to be assessed on the basis of four key factors:

• Altitude: The calibre is tested under a variety of atmospheric pressures simulating conditions ranging from sea level up to 1,004 metres, the altitude of our Manufacture.

On 

• Multidirectional Impacts: In its case, the watch is subjected to shocks ranging from 25G to 50G, applied systematically across standardised positions, to ensure durability in everyday use.

• Positions: The movement, once fitted into the case, is assessed through alternating periods of multi-position and fixed-position testing, examining its accuracy in every possible orientation.

• Temperature: The performance of the watch is analysed under significant temperature fluctuations, ranging from 18°C (simulating a period of rest) to 35°C (representative of periods of activity), ensuring its reliability in a variety of environments

COSC certification is also mentioned in passing: 

Each Master Control Chronometre, in addition to bearing the HPG hallmark, also holds the renowned COSC certification for chronometric precision. This dual certification highlights our dedication to high precision, a key factor when it comes to bearing the title of “Chronometer”.

Last and maybe in an uncommon move, JLC also adds a criteria relating to the sophistication of its finishing: 

The HPG label also aims to be a benchmark for decorative excellence. It indicates that every component of the calibre has been meticulously finished using eight traditional techniques: circular graining, Côtes de Genève, circular smoothing, burnishing, polishing of screw heads, linear smoothing, sinked rubies and bevelling. Drawing inspiration from the legacy of Antoine LeCoultre, we seek to transform functional craftsmanship into a high-quality artistic expression, where even circular graining, once purely utilitarian, can become a sophisticated aesthetic signature.

JLC’s explicative page does not make any comparison with the 1,000 hour control program. 

BEZOS NUMBERS

With this approach, JLC is trying to get the best of both worlds: we’re introduced to a new in-house certification that tries to closely mimic real-life conditions above and beyond the 1,000 programme or COSC certification but at the same time, the manufacture is happy to get along with COSC if just to be able to appose the Chronometer label on the collection. I can’t and won’t fault JLC for trying to breathe a bit of fresh air on a strategy that has been in place for a solid 24 years. Adding an aesthetics dimension to the in-house certification is a nice little touch - after all there’s value in finishing techniques and in this day and age, every little bit helps justifying why a client should pick one watch over another in a given price bracket. It’s a little hard though to say if HPG is just formalizing existing practices (some of which may not otherwise get noticed by prospective buyers) or if HPG is truly adding anything new to the way JLC is currently finishing its calibers.

Somme commenters, noting that the testing for HPG now takes place over 3 days of testing rather than several weeks, seem to assume this makes the whole bench less demanding than the 1,000 hour program and is meant as a way to save on costs. Maybe there’s an economical consideration with the new bench - but on the other hand, why not shorten the whole enterprise if the same result can be achieve in a shorter amount on time? I’m not privy to how many watches JLC has in testing at any one point in time, but I can certainly imagine that reducing the time a watch has to be held in testing from a couple of weeks down to a few days can significantly facilitate the life of the operations department. There’s no harm in that, save maybe for losing the appealingly simple “1,000 hour control” denomination.

The challenge with trying to pitt the new program against the hold is that in both cases, JLC is giving us “Bezos numbers” - measures that sound impressive on their face but are not telling us all that much in actuality. In tech circles, Jeff Bezos has become famous for using impressive  numbers in his presentation (e.g. “our market share has tripled in the past 12 month!”, “this is our biggest growth month ever!”) without providing key context (trippling a 1% market share isn’t exactly the same as tripping a 10% one!). For all the useful details shared about the 1,000 hour program or the HPG certification, JLC has never (to my knowledge) disclosed the tolerance a watch must reach to be certified. This makes any comparison (on precision alone at least) ultimately moot. COSC, by comparison, doesn’t shy away from publishing how many seconds per day a certified chronometer is allowed to have. 

1992 ALL OVER AGAIN

Does it ultimately really matter? Probably not. People don’t buy mechanical or luxury watches for their precision. While boasting excellent precision is one way to distinguish oneself from the competition, these certifications’s primary benefit is that they help tell a story about the product, if not the brand: “we do high quality watches, you can trust our expertise”. Whether a watch is able to work within -4/+6 or -2/+4 seconds per day is a discussion that will interest the purists, but not the general public - the very group of people that can make or break the financial fortunes of a watchmaker. These feeds and speeds don’t matter to the market any more than the clock speed of a mobile phone’s chip in the mobile phone world..  

In the case of JLC, I think the strategy being followed makes a ton of sense - just like the playbook did in 1992.

If you’re going to launch a new collection of watches, having a story to tell (and sell it in the name itself) is good product marketing. When JLC launched the Master Control in 1992, it was establishing its brand new round watch platform and needed something to make it stand out from its aging offering and the general competition. The Master Control was different from the Odysseus, Gentilhomme, Heraïon and Kryos of the day (heck, even different from the more recent Grand Reveil and Geographic) - and that difference was right in the name and in the accompanying 1000 hour control certification.

24 years later, Jerome Lambert is turning to the same playbook, with a twist: the new collection wears its difference right in the name (and this requires using COSC certification) but JLC still wants to communicate its superior manufacturing heritage and is doing so with a new in-house certification programme. I think that’s a smart way to give the new collection a chance to get noticed at launch, while also continuing to honor the core attributes of the Maison as one of the few able to do everything in house. JLC’s motto and reason for existing, all the way to its first family-owned decades, has always been “la montre de qualité”. This dual certification is the latest embodiment of that very idea.

Back in 1992 the manufacture was still in the middle of its turnaround, and the Master Control collection started with one caliber (cal. 889/1) and a grand total of one model (2). Even the contemporary Master Date (notice the subtle difference in name) didn’t start as a Master Control. Within a few years though, other round watches were either abandoned or moved into the Master Control Family (like the geographic, which launched 2 years before the Master Control, or the Gentilhomme reserve de Marche). JLC is in a much healthier position in 2026 and has launched the the Master Chronometer with 3 models (two of them in two metals). It’s unclear for now if this announces a future move of the entire Master Control catalogue into the Master Chronometer name and collection, or if JLC intends to keep its integrated bracelet models a thing of their own. I don’t see it as impossible - a Master Chronometer Geographic (if the caliber can be thinned out enough) would be fun, and a return of the Reserve de Marche in the Master Control catalogue could be imagined (and we already know that the relevant caliber can fit a 9.8mm case!). The good news with the COSC/HPG move is that beyond the performance standards it’s setting, it signals fresh winds at JLC and that can only be good news for la LeCoultre. 

________________________________________

1: like many other firms, JLC likes to recycle existing brands into completely different things depending on the era. The HPG name was previously used the 70s to signal watches judged particularly precise thanks to a high beat calibre cadenced at 4Hz - a technical achievement for the time.

2: Master Control was launched as ref. 140.840.892 (A) for the stainless steel, leather band flagship version. It came in 5 variations: 3 different metal (stainless steel, yellow gold, rose gold) with the stainless steel and yellow gold models available in a rice bracelet variant.