Patrick Evans’ Company Launch
The Financial times reported 3 days ago that former chief executive of the world’s third-largest diamond miner is launching a company making lab-grown diamonds, in the latest challenge to the mining industry from man-made stones. Patrick Evans, who left Canada’s Dominion Diamond in December, will pick a location in the US with access to cheap solar power to produce lab-grown diamonds targeting the bridal market. The development comes after a decision by the world’s largest diamond miner De Beers to start selling lab-grown diamond jewellery in September for the first time in its 130-year history.
“The industry is just not investing in exploration.”
Mr. Evans, a 22-year veteran of the diamond industry, said that his company would sell gem-quality diamonds larger than one carat for the engagement market. It hopes to achieve pricing at a discount of only 15 to 20 per cent off the cost of natural diamonds. The industry is just not investing in exploration Patrick Evans © Matthew Staver/Bloomberg
“Lab-grown diamonds are chemically identical to natural mined diamonds and can only be told apart using scanning machines”
“We don’t think it’s necessary to discount the product heavily,” Mr Evans said. “We think that we’ll be able to achieve natural pricing.” Mr Evans added that natural supplies of diamonds will soon run out as there have been no new discoveries of diamond mines, which are very hard to find. He expects natural diamond reserves to be almost completely depleted by the middle of the century. “I’ve explored on four continents — it’s about 1,000 times more difficult to find an economic diamond mine than a gold mine,” he said. “The industry is just not investing in exploration.” Lab-grown diamonds are chemically identical to natural mined diamonds and can only be told apart using scanning machines.