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Comment by ridgeguy | Hacker News Reader

DeBeers isn't buying out the labs. They're suing the labs for patent infringement [1].

The technology barrier to entry is low. If you have the tech chops and can spend $30K, you can do a DIY microwave plasma system and grow your own diamonds. I do this at home. Buying the extant labs won't inhibit subsequent competitors entering the business. And neither will lawsuits, in the long run. IP has a limited life.

I think the brain of the DeBeers dinosaur has finally noticed the mammals gnawing on its tail, and is responding in the only way it knows how. They would be better served to go into the synthetic business themselves, using their marketing resources and > 1 century of branding weight to carve out a new business sector. DeBeers is not a fast mover, so I don't expect this to happen.

[1] http://www.business-standard.com/article/markets/de-beers-gr...

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What size diamonds can you make with your gear and how long does it take? Could you scale/automate the operation easily?

Mine is mainly for research on plasma chemistry, so it's not set up for maximum deposition rate, which is an important parameter for commercial viability. I've made a 3.8 ct. unpolished stone in a 4 day run. If I were to do the laser trim (gets rid of the off-orientation edge growth) and send it out to be cut and polished, it would yield a nice DF brilliant-cut stone of ~ 1.25ct. weight. At retail, that might sell for ~$10K.

Systems optimized for commercial production will get to that weight in less than 24 hours with multiple substrates. Typically, they'll grow 10 - 25 stones at once. They do this by using much higher microwave power (typically 30-60kW) at a lower frequency (915MHz) which gives a larger plasma so they can cover multiple substrates. My system is 2kW @ 2.45GHz (same as microwave ovens), so its throughput is non-commercial. But it's a nice research tool for investigating how plasma chemistry affects diamond growth. And it's fun to grow diamonds in my garden shed! :-)

What kind of research are you doing? Sounds pretty cool!

I'm trying to optimize growth rate and quality as functions of plasma power density, deposition gas composition, pressure and substrate temperature. I think there's a lot of process improvement yet to be found.

In the biz environment, you typically get to something that has "good enough" economics, and you start shipping. At that point, you're afraid to touch the deposition equipment for fear of screwing up deliverables. This tends to freeze production economics at far less than what's possible.

I'm poking around to find the next 10x reduction in deposition costs. Everybody should be able to afford diamond doorknobs, don't you think?

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