The company was founded in 1884 by Alfred Lugrin under the name Lugrin SA in L'Orient Vallée de Joux . Lugrin acquired his expertise as a laborer at Jaeger-LeCoultre in Le Sentier . He specialized in the manufacture of chronographs , stopwatches , and repeater watches . In 1895, the company moved into its own factory building in L'Orient.
The name Lugrin SA was retained until 1930 , when Lugrin's son-in-law Marius Meylan established the brand name Lemania Watch Co., based in l'Orient.
In 1932 , Lemania, Omega , and Tissot merged to form the SSIH Group . Lemania rose to prominence when its Lemania 1873 movement was selected by NASA in 1962 and used in the Omega Speedmaster Professional (as Omega Caliber 861 ), which in turn caused a sensation in 1969 when it was used on the moon. This movement was developed by Albert Gustave Piguet .
In 1977, Lemania separated from SSIH through a management buyout and changed its name to Nouvelle Lemania. In 1992, Nouvelle Lemania joined the Breguet Watch Group and was acquired by the Swatch Group along with Breguet in 1999 .
Lemania, or Nouvelle Lemania, movements enjoyed a good reputation among experts. The Lemania 5100 automatic chronograph movement , whose production was discontinued at the end of 2002 , became famous for its robustness and reliability.
