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RAPAPORT... De Beers Group added five new sightholders to its list of participants for the remainder of the 2012 to 2015 supplier of choice (SOC) contract period. De Beers modified SOC re-planning process enables businesses that demonstrated sufficient demand through De Beers auction sales in 2012 to qualify for term contract supply and sightholder status.
Rapaport News confirmed that four Indian companies, including H. Dipak, Asian Star Company Limited, HVK International Pvt Ltd., and KP Sanghvi, and one Hong Kong-based company that has not been confirmed, were among the new sightholders. De Beers stated that it would update its sightholder directory when all 82 sightholders begin the 2013 to 2014 ITO period on March 31. (View the list as updated when the period began in April 2012.) Sightholder status is subject to De Beers forecast rough diamond availability and the eligible applicant’s submission of a contract proposal questionnaire as part of the 2013 ITO re-planning process. Each applicant for a SOC contract has been subject to the same rigorous and objective selection process as those applicants that applied for supply at the start of the 2012 to 2015 contract period, according to De Beers. Additionally, all applicants are required to adhere to the De Beers Best Practice Principles, ensuring that, sightholders are “living up to diamonds” by adopting clear ethical standards in their business practices. The ITO re-planning process also provided opportunities for existing sightholders to qualify for new rough diamond allocations as part of their 2013 to 2014 ITOs. The new allocations are subject to forecast availability and reflect sightholders’ demonstrated demand for rough diamond categories outside of their planned ITOs, according to the company. Philippe Mellier, the CEO of De Beers Group, said, “De Beers is proud to welcome five new businesses into the sightholder community. Our sightholders represent the world’s leading diamantaires and today’s announcement means that we will be better able to supply them with the right diamonds to support them in adding maximum value to our finite resource.” Varda Shine, the executive vice president of global sightholder sales, said, “The introduction of dynamism into this contract period is a further evolution in our supplier of choice strategy, which provides a greater level of flexibility for sightholders and enables De Beers’ distribution to be more efficient. We look forward to building strong and productive partnerships with our new sightholders.”
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