David Berdugo, Former Blue Nile COO, Named CEO of Caratwise

David Berdugo has spent his career watching two worlds drift apart: the independent jeweler with a loyal local clientele and the big e-tailer with the technology to close a custom sale before a customer ever walks through a door. His new role as CEO of Caratwise is, essentially, a bet that the gap can be closed.

Berdugo, formerly chief operating officer of both Blue Nile and James Allen, was appointed to lead Caratwise, a white-label custom-design platform owned by Indian diamond giant Hari Krishna. The platform is designed to be embedded directly on an independent retailer's website, giving shop owners real-time control over production, pricing, metal costs, and diamond selection without requiring the kind of technology investment that has historically been reserved for large e-commerce players.

The problem Berdugo describes is familiar to anyone who has worked a counter at a local jewelry store. "Many independent jewelers are familiar with customers coming with a screenshot from Brilliant Earth or Grown Brilliance and saying, 'Can you design this?'" he said. "This lets customers do it from the jeweler's website, and gives jewelers access to size and choice like never before."

The market case is straightforward. Berdugo cites that 85% of customers want personalization for bridal purchases and, given the choice, prefer to buy from an independent jeweler over a faceless online retailer. The obstacle is not desire on either side; it is infrastructure. "The big e-tailers have the technology, but they're not local, so they don't have the same trust," Berdugo said. "But the challenge for independents is they don't have the money to install sophisticated custom-design technology on their site."

Caratwise is currently focused on bridal design and is working with a select group of jewelers, with broader expansion planned for later in 2026. The company intends to eventually move beyond bridal, though no specific product categories or timelines for that expansion have been announced. Hari Krishna, the platform's parent company, is one of India's major diamond manufacturers, a ownership structure that could offer Caratwise significant upstream advantages in diamond sourcing as it scales.

For independent jewelers watching large online retailers absorb an ever-larger share of bridal business, the promise of a "frictionless" custom-design tool embedded in their own branded website represents a meaningful competitive shift. Whether Caratwise can deliver on that promise at scale remains the question its new CEO will need to answer.