In the world of Indian jewelry, where old and new come together, few names shine as brightly as Rupesh Jain. Jain started Candere in 2013, which changed the way Indians buy diamonds online and shook up an industry that had been around for thousands of years. He started out with a small business in a small office in Mumbai and ended up with a big company that Kalyan Jewellers bought. His story is a mix of tech-savvy ambition and family-rooted passion. Jain is back with Lucira, a brand of lab-grown diamonds that will appeal to millennials and Gen Z who care about the environment. This is the story of a founder who had the guts to make luxury digital.
Roots in Retail, Wings in Technology
Rupesh Jain grew up in Mumbai in a family of retail jewelers. He was surrounded by the touchable beauty of gold and gems. His family did well in physical stores, but Jain’s path took him toward code. He trained as an IT engineer and then worked as a software engineer at L&T Infotech before becoming the president of Ornet Technology. This is where his two worlds collided: the problems with traditional jewelry stores, like high markups, limited designs, and trust issues, and the limitless possibilities of e-commerce.
“I wanted to use what I knew about technology and what I had seen of how the market was changing to make the jewelry business that was passed down to me more interesting,” Jain said in an interview in 2025. What happened? Candere is an online store that sells gold, diamond, gemstone, platinum, and even gold coins. It was co-founded by Ashish Bajaj and launched in September 2013. Bajaj left the company in 2016. The name “Candere,” which comes from the Latin word for “to glow or shine,” summed up Jain’s goal: to make valuable items available, affordable, and useful in the digital age.
Candere started small, renting a space that could only fit three people. They got their first investment of ₹2.5 crore from Singularity Strategic, a family office in Hyderabad. This investment grew to ₹4.2 crore. The platform appealed to city-dwelling millennials who didn’t want heavy family heirlooms by focusing on lightweight, trendy designs. “We saw that there was a need for precious jewelry to be more versatile on online platforms,” the company’s timeline says, stressing curated catalogs and easy shopping.
How to Grow Candere from a Startup to a Scale-Up
Candere grew quickly under Jain’s direction as Founder and CEO. By 2017, it had more than 4,000 designs, a loyal customer base that kept coming back, and it had grown into the US and UK markets. The Mumbai office, which has three floors, is home to more than 100 employees and gets 1.5 million visitors each month. Jain’s tech integration was very important. Virtual try-ons, AI-driven personalization, and marketing automation all cut costs, raised margins, and kept prices competitive. “Optimizing the cost of manufacturing has led to a direct increase in the margins,” he said, giving credit to his knowledge of e-commerce.
There were many problems. When buying jewelry, you need to be sure of the quality and size. Jain was able to do this by doing strict quality checks, offering lifetime buybacks, and following the “handcrafting precious memories” philosophy. Angel investments came in after early funding problems, and by 2016, the founders’ stakes were worth ₹3.04 crore. “It shaped me as an entrepreneur and as a person,” Jain said of the grind.
The switch to omnichannel was a sign of bigger things to come. Candere’s online-first model worked well with its offline goals, which set the stage for huge growth.
The Kalyan Jewellers Deal: A Great Deal
In April 2017, Kalyan Jewellers, a trust known for Indian fine jewelry, bought Candere for about ₹40 crore. The deal got rid of Singularity Strategic’s stakes and started a phased buyout of Jain’s equity. This combined Candere’s digital flexibility with Kalyan’s huge supply chain and more than 100 stores. Rajesh Kalyanaraman, Kalyan’s Executive Director, said, “Candere has built a loyal online customer base in India with one of the best repeat rates in the business.”
After the purchase, Candere became “Powered by Kalyan Jewellers” and put famous collections like Ziah, Glo, and Mudhra online. It grew to include West Asia (UAE, Kuwait, Qatar) and made ₹130.3 crore in revenue in FY24. Jain remained CEO and led the company toward hybrid retail. Kalyan closed the deal in 2024, buying Jain’s last 15% stake for ₹42 crore. This made Candere a fully owned subsidiary. Jain said, “The Candere journey has been a lifetime adventure, full of learning and creating value like no other.” He praised the partnership’s role in scaling.
This exit wasn’t the end; it was the start. Kalyan’s push for an omnichannel approach, with 11 new showrooms in FY24 and plans to quadruple that number, fit with Jain’s vision, which saw online sales making up 5–7% of the company’s total sales.
Jain’s Bold Return to Lab-Grown Luxury with Lucira
Jain didn’t stop working after Candere’s full handover in 2024. In April 2025, he launched Lucira, a brand that started out small and focused on digital products. It sells certified lab-grown diamond (LGD) rings for engagements, weddings, and anniversaries. Lucira focuses on ethical sourcing and targets environmentally conscious Gen Z and millennials. LGDs cost 20–25% of natural diamonds (for example, a ₹100 natural solitaire is equal to ₹20–25 LGD) and offers Cartier-level quality at prices that are easy to reach.
“Lucira is about making meaningful moments better with timeless design and ethical brilliance,” Jain said. It is a premium but useful disruptor in a market expected to reach $59.2 billion by 2032, thanks to features like AI customization, virtual try-ons, and collections based on the zodiac. Lucira plans to grow its business over the next two years by hiring people in merchandising and technology to help with this. Margins? A juicy 15–40%, which is much more than gold’s thinner cuts.
Jain’s return shows how adaptable he is: “Perseverance, adaptability, and trust—these are what the journey of building Candere has been all about.” Recent news, like Shah Rukh Khan’s partnership with Candere, shows how powerful the stars in this field are.
A History of Shine
Rupesh Jain’s journey from coding cubicles to curating solitaires changes what it means to be an Indian entrepreneur. He brought together people of different ages in the jewelry business, showing that technology can make tradition more appealing without taking away from it. As Lucira shines on the horizon, Jain’s motto remains: “No matter what, we will always find a way to make our customers happy with beautiful jewelry.” Jain is not just a founder; he is the spark that will start the next glow in an industry that is ready for change.
