The power behind De Beers' strategic masterstroke

If you can’t beat them, join them, then crush them. From decades of fighting against synthetics, proclaiming them as the single biggest threat to natural diamonds and the industry, De Beers announced it had changed tact this week and was launching its own synthetic line of diamonds.

Typical of De Beers, the nomenclature around its synthetics is uniquely its own. Rather than “synthetics,” De Beers’ artificial diamonds are called “lab-grown”. In the same vein, De Beers’ monthly sales of diamonds are not called auctions, but “sights,” and the buyers aren’t “bidders” but “sightholders”.