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Diamonds are forever: But what about the diamond mining industry? Can it survive lab-grown diamonds?

Diamonds are forever: But what about the diamond mining industry? Can it survive lab-grown diamonds?

5/4/21 7:00PM

Diamonds are forever. Perhaps one of the most famous marketing taglines of all time, first penned by Frances Gerety in 1947, has stuck in the diamond industry ever since. But, the diamond industry as we know it, may be under threat.

Opening Pandora's box

This week Pandora, which is the world's largest jewellery company, announced that from now on they would no longer offer mined diamonds — instead only sourcing diamonds that are created in a laboratory. This is a big deal for lab-grown diamonds, which only accounted for 6-7 million carats of global diamond production last year (according to a report from Bain).

The ability to create a diamond in a lab is not new. In fact, the first synthetic diamond was reportedly created in 1954 — just 7 years after Frances Gerety wrote her famous marketing slogan. So far then, the mined-diamond industry has been doing just fine, with lab-grown alternatives gaining little traction before the last decade.

However, recent advances in technology, coupled with increasingly ethically focused consumers, has meant that both the demand and supply of lab-grown diamonds has increased significantly in the last decade. Pandora's announcement this week is likely to accelerate that trend.

The diamond mining industry might need another slogan.

P.S. Decent video explanation of how lab-grown diamonds are made can be found here.

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Dell shares get a boost on reports of $5 billion deal to sell servers to Musk’s xAI

Dell isnt just a company that sells work laptops with excessive McAfee pop-ups.

Bloomberg reports that the PC powerhouse is close to striking a $5 billion deal to sell AI-optimized servers containing Nvidia semiconductors to Elon Musks xAI. Its shares were up more than 3% intraday.

Dell has rapidly boosted the AI server side of its business. In its November earnings report, Dell said it shipped $2.9 billion worth of AI servers and has an order backlog of $4.5 billion. Its servers and networking revenue rose 58% to $7.4 billion on the quarter. Analysts expect Dell to ship $14 billion worth of AI servers in its current fiscal year.

Last month, xAI launched a free app for its flagship chatbot, Grok.

Dell has rapidly boosted the AI server side of its business. In its November earnings report, Dell said it shipped $2.9 billion worth of AI servers and has an order backlog of $4.5 billion. Its servers and networking revenue rose 58% to $7.4 billion on the quarter. Analysts expect Dell to ship $14 billion worth of AI servers in its current fiscal year.

Last month, xAI launched a free app for its flagship chatbot, Grok.

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Meta joins Tesla as an AI robot company

As goes Elon Musk’s Tesla, so goes Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta.

Now, Meta is following Tesla into AI-powered humanoid robots, Bloomberg reports.

Last month, Musk predicted that in the long term, its AI-powered Optimus robots — which in demos have so far been powered by humans — “will be overwhelmingly the value” of Tesla.

Now Meta plans to develop its own robots with the help of outside robotics companies. Initially these humanoid robots will help with household chores, but Meta’s “bigger ambition is to make the underlying AI, sensors and software for robots that will be manufactured and sold by a range of companies,” Bloomberg reported.

Meta will have to hurry. Musk said his company intends to build 10,000 of its Optimus robots this year, but he hedged during the latest earnings call.

“Will we succeed in building 10,000 exactly by the end of December this year? Probably not, but will we succeed in making several thousand? Yes, I think we will,” Musk said.

Meta’s robot project will be part of its Reality Labs hardware division — the one that lost nearly $18 billion last year.

Presumably, unlike earlier versions of Metaverse avatars, Meta’s robots will have legs, but we don’t know for sure.

Now Meta plans to develop its own robots with the help of outside robotics companies. Initially these humanoid robots will help with household chores, but Meta’s “bigger ambition is to make the underlying AI, sensors and software for robots that will be manufactured and sold by a range of companies,” Bloomberg reported.

Meta will have to hurry. Musk said his company intends to build 10,000 of its Optimus robots this year, but he hedged during the latest earnings call.

“Will we succeed in building 10,000 exactly by the end of December this year? Probably not, but will we succeed in making several thousand? Yes, I think we will,” Musk said.

Meta’s robot project will be part of its Reality Labs hardware division — the one that lost nearly $18 billion last year.

Presumably, unlike earlier versions of Metaverse avatars, Meta’s robots will have legs, but we don’t know for sure.

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