Goldiam International Ltd was incorporated in 1986 and it is engaged in the business of manufacturing and exporting gold and diamond jewellery to global retailers. The company is a supplier of natural diamond and lab-grown diamond jewellery to global retailers, departmental stores, and wholesalers. Its product includes engagement rings, wedding bands, anniversary rings, bridal sets, earrings and pendants. Goldiam has transitioned itself from a pure natural diamond in-store jewellery company to a major supplier of lab-grown diamond jewellery, with an omnichannel sales strategy. The Co. is one of the few makers of diamond jewellery that is fully backward integrated across the supply chain of lab-grown diamond growing, cutting, jewellery manufacturing & distribution. This ensures smooth communication, faster turnaround time, and an efficient product development cycle.
Origem, the lab-grown diamond brand by Goldiam International Limited, commenced its retail journey on Oct 25, 2024, with the inauguration of its first store in Borivali, Mumbai. This was Goldiam's first venture into direct-to-consumer retail, with the goal of providing innovative and sustainable jewelry options. Following the success of its debut, Origem expanded its footprint by opening a second store in Kharghar, Navi Mumbai, in Dec 2024. The brand further solidified its presence with a third flagship store on Jan 23, 2025, at Turner Road, Bandra West, Mumbai. This rapid expansion underscores Origem's commitment to making lab-grown diamond jewellery more accessible to consumers seeking ethical and eco-friendly luxury.
Thesis
Moving Away From Traditional Channels- Leading to Better Operational Efficiency
Goldiam International has a niche business model in jewellery; it is an OEM to renowned global retailers. Goldiam manufactures the latest trend, high-value diamond-studded jewellery (engagement and anniversary rings, wedding bands, bridal sets, fashion pendants, necklaces, and earnings) in various designs and types and sells to leading global retailers, with a chain of stores as well as jewellery wholesalers, who, in turn, sell to smaller retailers.
Goldiam, which commenced operations in 1988, has established substantial brand equity and has received various awards from the government for being a pioneer and role model in jewellery exports.
The company made a conscious decision to move away from low margins business to better margins business.
The company has constantly evolved its business towards higher margins. The constant innovation and backward integration have made Goldiam a preferred choice for a lot of vendors
Goldiam has fully backward integration capabilities, with an in-house design team that identifies the emerging fashion trends for manufacturing jewellery, and it sources diamonds with pre-requisite norms in terms of cut, clarity, colour and carat. The company manufactures jewellery in-house and is among the few players with a patent for the laboratory-manufacturing process.
E-Commerce channel- strategic focus
Goldiam is focusing on the e-commerce platform to enable it to reach a more extensive section of retailers and reduce its dependence on wholesalers. Besides the enhanced reach, e-commerce has higher margins and lower working capital days (10-30 days compared to 120-150 days for traditional sales channels).
Goldiam has also scaled up its online business in the last few years, contributing almost 20% of the top line. In this business, the company caters to orders received via the e-commerce portals of large retailers. These orders are directly shipped to the end client by Goldiam, reducing the retailer’s lead time and helping them optimise their inventory. The transaction’s just-in-time nature and the handling of shipments help yield better margins versus bulk supply to physical stores. This is a negative working capital business as the payment terms are better than supply to physical stores.
E-Commerce could potentially be a game changer for the company (currently contributes ~20%), with a negative working capital cycle
How the E-Commerce business works
In times of COVID-19, people preferred to buy online, and the company is witnessing traction in e-commerce sales. Goldiam has managed to take the digital channel to about 20% of sales in a short period and aims to increase this to 30-40% of revenue.
Online orders are processed and shipped faster than traditional brick & mortar orders, enabling the improvement of cash & cash equivalent. This leads to adverse working capital requirements due to favourable payment terms and allows higher returns. E-commerce reach empowers the company to cater to customers in regions with limited physical footprints.
Goldiam has a golden chance at Jewel Feet. The US jewellery market comprises prominent, organised players, accounting for nearly 60% of the market; the rest contains independent Mom & Pop jewellery stores. While the penetration across large retailers is quite suitable for Goldiam, it has a limited presence across independent jewellers. To address this market, the company has recently commissioned an e-commerce portal called JewelFleet. This portal will let small jewellers order existing/custom designs (1000+ SKUs) which will be manufactured and shipped within seven days to the jeweller.
North American jewellery sales online Covid has accelerated the growth of E-Commerce for Jewellery in the American market, which is likely to continue going forward.
Advantage India – when it comes to exports to the American market
India majorly exports cut & polished diamonds, lab-grown synthetic diamonds, coloured gemstones, synthetic stone, plain and studded gold jewellery, silver & platinum jewellery, imitation jewellery and articles of gold, silver and others. Western Region is a critical exporting hub for the gems and jewellery industry, contributing almost 77% of the total exports in 2021-22.
Gems and jewellery commodities export growth in 2021-2022 over 2019-2020
India is one the biggest exporters of gem and jewellery globally, accounting for 3.5% of the overall export opportunity.
India’s gems and jewellery exports account for about 3.5% of the world’s total exports, making it the seventh-highest exporter globally. The country is ranked first in diamonds jewellery, silver jewellery and lab-grown diamonds & Synthetic stones with 29.0%, 22.0% and 32.7% share of the world’s exports, respectively. India’s gems and jewellery exports stood at US$ 39.31 billion in the year 2021-22, which is higher than the pre-covid exports of US$ 35.60 billion in 2019-20, recording a growth of 10.44%.
India's gems and jewellery exports (US$ billion)
India exports gems and jewellery to the USA, Hong Kong, UAE, Belgium, Israel, Thailand, Singapore, the UK, Netherlands, Japan, etc. The USA is the largest importer of Indian jewellery, with 2021-22 imports valued at US$ 14.5 billion, growing from US$ 8.7 billion of exports in 2020-21.
Export destinations
India is the biggest exporter to the American market
The US gets most of its diamonds from relatively few countries. According to diamond trade statistics published by the United States International Trade Commission, more than half of the polished diamonds imported into the US in 2021 were from India.
Israel was the second largest source of polished diamonds imported into the US. It accounted for a quarter of diamond imports by value. Belgium was the third largest source, with another 9% of polished diamond imports in 2021.
Collectively, these three countries supplied 87% of US diamond imports. Together with South Africa and Switzerland, five countries were the source of 92% of the diamond imports.
US polished diamonds imports by country, 2021 ( Top 10 )
Exports of polished lab-grown diamonds from India jumped about 70% in the April-July period to $622.7 million, while those of cut and polished mined diamonds fell around 3% to $8.2 billion during the same period.
Lab-Based Diamonds - Shining Bright
What are Lab-based Diamonds
Lab-grown diamonds are diamonds that were grown by scientists in a lab. They share the same chemical makeup as natural diamonds and are optically identical. The most significant differences between natural and lab-created diamonds are how they’re made and how rare they are.
Are they Real?
Laboratory-grown diamonds share an identical chemical makeup to natural diamonds, consisting of pure carbon in a cubic crystalline form. The difference between lab-grown diamonds and natural diamonds is how they are formed. While lab-grown diamonds can be produced for a few weeks in a laboratory, natural diamonds form beneath the surface of the earth over millions of years. Initially, the acceptance of lab-grown diamonds was low as large diamond miners opposed it. But in 2018, in a ruling by the Federal Trade Commission in the US, lab-grown diamonds earned the status of being called diamonds, making them officially optically, physically and chemically equivalent to natural diamonds; however, to make it easier to distinguish between the two and avoid deceptive advertisement – the origin of the diamond had to be mentioned (why they are termed Lab-grown diamonds)
How are lab-based diamonds made?
There are a few methods used to create lab-grown diamonds. Typically, lab-grown diamonds start with a tiny lab diamond, like a seed. The seeds are placed in a chamber called a plasma reactor (in the case of CVD synthesis) or a large mechanical press (if manufactured by HPHT). Then, depending on the technology used, some combination of heat, pressure and a carbon source is used to make the crystals grow, layer by layer
The CVD Method- CVD stands for chemical vapour deposition Lab-grown diamond seeds are loaded into a CVD reactor. Then, a mix of gasses containing carbon is added at very low pressure. Microwave energy is used to heat the gases and generate plasma. The gas molecule breaks down when the temperature rises above several thousand degrees
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