Alrosa Collaborates on WeChat Blockchain

RAPAPORT... Alrosa will help launch a blockchain-based provenance program offering Chinese consumers greater transparency when buying jewelry via WeChat. The e-commerce program, apartnership with blockchain platform Everledger and Chinese Internet giantTencent Holdings, will be available to nearly a billion WeChat users, thecompanies said Monday. WeChat, which is owned by Tencent, is a multipurpose messaging, social-media and mobile-payment app. The traceability platform will be applied to a "mini program," a sub-application within the WeChat system that enables advanced features such as e-commerce and task management. During the pilot phase, the product will feature diamonds mined in Russia by Alrosa, and will contain information on the stone's provenance and fullcertificate details. The groups will offer the program to jewelry manufacturersand retailers in China as a white-label API, which enables them to create their own platformand offer it under their own name. "This exciting development...brings provenance andauthenticity of diamonds to a new level of transparency in China," saidEverledger chief operating officer Chris Taylor. "Making this informationavailable to consumers' fingertips via WeChat enables them to be sure about thesource and the credentials of each item being purchased." The program will also help Alrosa expand its client base inthe Chinese market, the miner explained.  "[The venture] reinforces our pursuit forguaranteeing the origin of our products," explained Pavel Vinikhin, head ofdiamonds for Alrosa's polishing division. "We believe that this collaborationwith the most popular social-media platform in China will help us to furtherstrengthen our sales there." Image: Polished diamonds. (Alrosa)