Leviev, Sodiam Officially Open Rough Sales Office

Israeli diamond dealer Lev Leviev and the Chairman of Empresa Nacional de Diamantes de Angola (ENDIAMA) Manuel Arnaldo de Sousa Calado officially opened a rough diamond selling company in Israel yesterday (Wednesday), setting out their plans for a strategic marketing partnership of Angolan diamonds and an Angolan diamond brand.

The new company, Sodiam International Inc., is an equal partnership of the Leviev group and Sodiam S.A.R.L., the Angolan diamond marketing company controlled by ENDIAMA.

“This is a historical moment. From now we are partners, hand in hand, from the moment the diamonds are extracted from the ground we will sort the diamonds, polish them, make jewelry together and create a brand – Angolan Diamonds,” said Leviev at a ceremony to inaugurate the joint venture.

Leviev has a home advantage now, or as he puts it, “We will be ahead of everybody because we were the first to ‘straddle’ the whole pipeline from top to bottom.”

For the second time in two days, Leviev publicly wondered about the claim that African diamonds can’t be polished where they are extracted, in a thinly veiled reference to De Beers, which exports all its goods from producing countries for sorting in London before selling them to DTC Sightholders.

Leviev made the same line of comments at a major rough diamond conference held in Tel Aviv this week.

Echoing Leviev’s question, Calado said his country needs more help of the kind received from Leviev and thanked him for his support, calling for investments in the country’s human resources.

Calado noted that in the Angolan collective memory, diamonds are viewed as a tool of war that were traded illegally and contributed to the continuation of war in the country.

The office in Ramat Gan is expected to start sales operations in about a month.