Varda Shine heads the Diamond Trading Company (DTC), the World’s largest rough diamond distribution company, handling around 40% of global production.  Varda has been instrumental in the recent transformation of the DTC, integrating Beneficiation at the heart of the company’s activities and providing a groundbreaking development structure for diamond producing partner countries.

Varda was also a key player in the strategic review undertaken by De Beers at the turn of the century, fulfilling a key role in the creation of the DTC’s demand-led business model.

Varda initially developed her commercial and diamond trading expertise in the De Beers’ Diamdel operation in Tel Aviv in Israel. She learnt the business from the bottom up, having joined the diamond industry during an eight month gap between her mandatory Israeli army service and the intended start of a university course to study medicine. After being ‘bitten by the diamond bug’, Varda decided to stay with Diamdel and quickly showed her value to the business by developing a ‘stock management system’ which is still in use in some operations today.

Varda moved to the Diamond Trading Company in London in 1997 and immediately made an impact by employing her market knowledge to develop a new rough diamond assortment for the company. By 1999 she was a Diamond Manager, responsible for the production of the entire +2 carat diamond range and for leading the integration of information systems at the DTC which created a shorter internal supply chain and enhanced efficiencies for De Beers.

In September 2003, having played a key role in the company’s strategic review, Varda was appointed DTC Sales Director, responsible for Key Account Management, Sales Planning, Business Change and e-Business. After a successful 22-year tenure within the De Beers Family of Companies, she was appointed to the position of DTC Managing Director in January 2006.

During her time as Managing Director Varda has overseen the creation of an international network of DTC operations, with joint venture companies being established with the Governments of Botswana and Namibia, and a wholly owned DTC entity founded in South Africa. These businesses have enabled Botswana, Namibia and South Africa to extract further value from downstream diamond industry activities, while creating thousands of jobs and transferring key diamond-related skills to the region.

A very respected member of the international diamond community, Varda was the first woman to be awarded honorary lifetime membership of the Israel Diamond Exchange (IDE).

Varda has participated in business and management courses at Templeton College, Oxford University; Cranfield University School of Management, UK; INSEAD, France; Technion (Israel Institute of Technology), Haifa, Israel; and Tel Aviv University, Israel. She is also a governing Board member of the Diamond Empowerment Fund, a non-profit international organisation with the mission to raise money to support education initiatives that develop and empower economically disadvantaged people in African nations where diamonds are a natural resource.

Varda is married with one son. She enjoys operas, old movies, walking holidays and keeping in contact with her friends.