Richard Mille

Richard Mille was founded in 2001 by Richard Mille, a French executive who had run the watch division of Mauboussin, and Dominique Guenat, owner of the case-maker and watch company Montres Valgine in Les Breuleux, in the Swiss Jura. The first watch, the RM 001 Tourbillon, was shown at Baselworld in 2001 with a movement developed by Audemars Piguet Renaud & Papi, and it set the pattern for the brand: a tonneau case, a skeletonised movement with a baseplate in titanium or carbon, and an approach to construction borrowed from motor racing and aeronautics rather than from traditional watch decoration.

Later models applied these ideas to wearability under stress, notably the RM 027 developed with Rafael Nadal in 2010, which weighed under 20 grams with its strap, and the RM 011 chronograph. The company works with materials such as Carbon TPT and Quartz TPT, produced by North Thin Ply Technology. It remains privately owned, is based in Les Breuleux, and produces a few thousand watches a year.