Auction house Sotheby’s Dubai has unveiled a diamond that’s literally from out of this world.
Sotheby’s calls the 555.55-carat black diamond — believed to have come from outer space — “The Enigma.” The rare gem was shown off on Monday to journalists as part of a tour in Dubai and Los Angeles before it is due to be auctioned off in February in London.
Sotheby’s expects the diamond to be sold for at least 5 million British pounds ($6.8 million). The auction house plans to accept cryptocurrency as a possible payment as well.
Sophie Stevens, a jewelry specialist at Sotheby’s Dubai, told The Associated Press that the number five bears an importance significance to the diamond, which has 55 facets as well.
“The shape of the diamond is based on the Middle-Eastern palm symbol of the Khamsa, which stands for strength and it stands for protection,” she said. Khamsa in Arabic means five.
“So there’s a nice theme of the number five running throughout the diamond," she added.
Stevens also said the black diamond is likely from outer space.
“With the carbonado diamonds, we believe that they were formed through extraterrestrial origins, with meteorites colliding with the Earth and either forming chemical vapor disposition or indeed coming from the meteorites themselves,” she said.
Black diamonds, also known as carbonado, are extremely rare, and are found naturally only in Brazil and Central Africa. The cosmic origin theory is based on their carbon isotopes and high hydrogen content.
Former Take-Two CEO Kelly Sumner is looking for the next big game. But rather than investing hundreds of millions, his blockchain-based video game publisher Planet Digital Partners is targeting mid-level games often ignored by big publishers.
"Electronic Arts, Take-Two, Activision ($ATVI), etc., they are spending hundreds of millions of dollars on a game, expecting to be ... getting billions. And the kind of middle, where there's sort of really good, exciting games, isn't there," Sumner told Cheddar Friday.
Rapper Tip "T.I." Harris has already built a reputation as a musician, producer, and actor, but now he's looking to add tech investor to his credits with the launch of his new company, TechCypha. TechCypha is a "group of entertainers, entrepreneurs, executives that all want to pool our funds together for the purpose of providing technology to add culture," T.I. told Cheddar in an interview Friday.
Goop, Gwyneth Paltrow's 10-year-old lifestyle and wellness brand, now counts stores in southern California, New York and London, where the Goop pop-up was recently given permanent brick-and-mortar status. Soon, an eponymous Netflix show will launch, joining a book imprint, podcast and website. But, as CCO Elise Loehnen told Cheddar, the content strategy is but one arm of the expanding business ー retail is the other.
New Age Beverages Corporation knew there was one thing missing from the cannabis-infused drink industry: Bob Marley. The company is getting ready to distribute three CBD-infused drinks bearing the name of the reggae legend. New Age Beverages CEO Brent Willis told Cheddar that combining Marley's likeness with a cannabis beverage was a natural fit.
These are the headlines you Need 2 Know for Friday, Jan. 18, 2019.
LiveXLive is a platform that brings festivals and other live events to music enthusiasts who can't afford to attend in-person. "We set out to take the playbook from ESPN, to create the next generation MTV," founder Robert Ellin told Cheddar Thursday.
Shares of Netflix tumbled after the market close on Thursday after the streaming giant just missed analyst expectations on revenue, and forecast weaker than expected earnings and revenue for the current quarter.
Inflated housing prices and long commute times in tech hubs nationwide is "sapping the vitality" from cities, Microsoft President Brad Smith told Cheddar Thursday following the company's announcement it would invest $500 million to address affordable housing and homelessness in and around Seattle, Wash.
Marty McFly's self-lacing sneakers from "Back to the Future" are here at last. Kind of. Nike on Tuesday launched the Adapt BB, its first mass-market "smart" sneaker, that uses elastic mesh and a small internal motor with Bluetooth connectivity to allow the wearer to tighten and loosen the fit of the shoe via a smartphone app.
Ford Motor Company and Volkswagen AG announced at the Detroit Auto Show they will form a "broad alliance," but the reality of a partnership may present certain conflicts for both companies. "I think that this is going to be a very difficult friendship to make work because Ford ($F) is expected to make some pickup trucks for Volkswagen, which sounds good because Volkswagen needs those pickups in other markets," Nathan Bomey, business reporter at USA Today, told Cheddar Wednesday.
