De+Beers

De Beers is a Privately held company, they were founded in 1888, they're heardquarter is in Johannesburg, South Africa. De beers and the various companies within the De Beers Family of Companies engange in search for diamonds, diamond mining, diamond trading and industrial diamond manufacture. De Beers is active in every category of industrial diamond mining, open pit, underground, large-scale alluvial, coastal and deep sea. Mining takes place in places such as Botswana, Namibia, South Africa and Canada.

Cecil Rhodes, the founder of De Beers, got his start by renting water pumps to miners duringthe diamond rush that started in 1871, when a 83.5 carat diamond was found on Colesburg Kopje, South Africa. He invested the profits of his operation into buying up claims of small mining operators, with his operations soon expanding into a separate mining company.

When Rhodes died in 1902, De Beers controlled 90% of the world's diamond production. Ernest oppenheimer took over the chairmanship of the company in 1927, after buying a seat on the board a year earlier. Oppenheimer was very concerned about the discovery of diamonds in 1908 in german South West Africa, fearing that the increased supply would swamp the market and force the prices down.

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