The name Jaeger-LeCoultre takes us back in time to one of Switzerland's oldest and most prestigious watch companies. Founded in 1863 by Antoine LeCoultre in Le Vallée de Joux, Switzerland, it is also one of the only major watch companies that is still located at its original address.

"Chronograph" is the complication of recording short periods of time. In the beginning this short interval was limited to one minute. The recording device, for lack of a better description, was nothing more than a fountain pen at the end of a seconds hand making an ink trace at the perimeter of the watch dial. Needless to say, the pen needed constant refurbishment of ink and the dial wiped clean at the end of each timed event. Terribly inconvenient by modern standards, but it was the start of something that has endured to this day.

Coming back to the Jaeger-LeCoultre Duometre Chronograph, what is "Duometre" and what makes it special? The basic idea was to separate the normal time keeping function of the watch (hours, minutes, and seconds) from the chronograph function.

In most chronograph wristwatches, the time keeping and chronograph functions share a common power source. In simple terms, this means that when the chronograph function is operated, power to the time keeping function is reduced and thus affects the accuracy of time keeping. The Duometre overcame this problem by using two separate power sources (and gear trains) – one for the time keeping function and another for the chronograph function. Sounds simple? Not so. Until now, two separate power sources in a wristwatch have been reserved only for the super complicated sonnerie (clock) watches and are difficult to construct.  So the Duometre(dual meter) is akin to having two watches in one.