Pandora opens $150 million Vietnam plant, capacity up 50%
The Ho Chi Minh City site opened 1 October, Pandora's first outside Thailand and its fourth worldwide, with room for 60 million pieces a year. It will employ 7,000 when fully operational.
By Carat Capital
What changed
The plant opened. Pandora began crafting in Ho Chi Minh City on 1 October 2026. The USD 150 million site lifts the group's manufacturing capacity by 50% and is its first production plant outside Thailand.
What it means
- If you buy Pandora wholesale: Capacity changed, not price. No Pandora price list moved with this.
- If you craft in Thailand: A second country now shares the volume, and the academy moves skills both ways.
- What this is not: A diamond-growing plant. No stone is grown here; the lab-grown remarks are a separate answer.
Key figures
| Invested in the sitePandora's own figure | $150m |
|---|---|
| Group crafting capacitythe release's own wording | +50% |
| Pieces a yearcapacity when fully ramped | 60m |
| Local jobswhen fully operational | 7,000 |
Source: Pandora A/S press release, 1 October 2026, pandoragroup.com · page read direct, 180,271 bytes; chief executive's figures from CNBC, published 2 October 2026 04:16 UTC, 786,041 bytes
The release gives six figures.
Six figures published. Pandora puts the investment at USD 150 million and the site's annual capacity at 60 million pieces. The facility lifts group crafting capacity by 50%.
Land and jobs follow. The release gives 7,000 local jobs when fully operational, on a 7.5-hectare plot in Vietnam-Singapore Industrial Park III. The building holds LEED Gold certification.
| Item | Figure | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Investment | USD 150 million | Press release |
| Annual capacity added | 60 million pieces | Press release |
| Capacity uplift, group | 50% | Press release |
| Local jobs at full operation | 7,000 | Press release |
| Site area | 7.5 hectares | Press release |
| Rank among Pandora plants | Fourth, and first outside Thailand | Press release |
| Implied prior annual capacity | About 120 million pieces | Carat Capital |
| Implied new annual capacity | About 180 million pieces | Carat Capital |
Notes on this table
The first six rows are figures published in Pandora's own release of 1 October 2026 and were grepped in the saved bytes before being printed. The last two are Carat Capital's arithmetic on the release's own wording: 60 million pieces is stated to be a 50% increase, so 60/0.50 = 120 million pieces as the prior annual capacity and 180 million as the new total. Pandora publishes neither of those two figures and neither is attributed to it. The release's description of the site as the world's largest fine jewellery crafting facility is the company's own claim and is not verified here.
First plant outside Thailand.
Thailand keeps the craft. This is Pandora's first production site outside Thailand and its fourth worldwide. The company's crafting academy is to move skills between the two countries.
Power is renewable. The facility runs solely on renewable electricity and uses 100% recycled silver and gold. Pandora already crafts all its jewellery from recycled silver and gold.
Platinum plating follows. The release names the site's role in future platinum-plated jewellery as the company widens its materials. It gives no volume or launch date for that line.
Asia carries the growth case.
Asia grew ten percent. Chief executive Berta de Pablos-Barbier told CNBC the region grew 10% in the second quarter. She said Japan's business has roughly doubled in three years.
China turned. After three years of declines, Pablos-Barbier said China is returning to growth this year. She put lab-grown stones' carbon emissions around 90% below mined ones.
What to watch
- 4 November 2026Pandora's Q3 2026 interim report, the first after the opening, and whether Asia's 10% second-quarter growth rate holds.
- Full ramp, date not publishedWhether the 60 million-piece capacity and the 7,000 jobs arrive together; the release dates neither.
- The platinum-plated lineWhether a volume or a price is attached to the material the release names but does not size.
The story so far
Go deeper
What would change this call
A ramp that slips. Every figure above is a capacity figure, not an output figure, and Pandora attaches no date to full operation: 60 million pieces a year and 7,000 jobs are both stated as the fully operational state, not as 2026. If the ramp runs long, the 50% uplift is an option the company holds rather than volume the trade can buy, and the group's reported organic growth of 3% in the second quarter is the better guide to what is actually selling. The second reading that would reverse the desk's view is a Q3 report on 4 November 2026 that carries a Vietnam start-up cost line large enough to move group margin.
What a crafting capacity figure counts
A crafting capacity figure is the number of finished pieces a plant can produce in a year at its designed run rate, not the number it will produce. It is set by the installed bench positions, the shifts the site is designed to run and the throughput of the plating and setting lines, and it is published by the company rather than measured by anyone outside it. That matters for reading the 50% in this release two ways. As a capacity number it is exact arithmetic on Pandora's own installed base: 60 million pieces added to a base the company does not state, which the division in the table puts at about 120 million. As a trading number it says nothing at all, because a plant at designed capacity and a plant at half of it both carry the same capacity figure. The practical consequence for a buyer is that this release changes what Pandora can supply and not what it will price, which is why the key figures above carry no price and the desk's view says the price list did not move.
Method
Three documents were fetched with a browser identity and saved as raw bytes before any figure was written: Pandora's own press release, 200, 180,271 bytes; CNBC's report, 200, 786,041 bytes, JSON-LD datePublished 2026-10-02T04:16:04+0000; and Pandora's financial calendar, 200, 366,564 bytes. Every figure printed was grepped in the saved files and the hit counts are: '150 million' present in the release and 17 times in CNBC's page, '60 million' once in the release and 5 times in CNBC's, '7,000' once in the release body and 7 times in CNBC's, '50%' present in both, '7.5-hectare' present in the release, 'DKK 32.5 billion' present in the release boilerplate, '10% in the second quarter' present in CNBC's text, '90% fewer' present in CNBC's text, and 'Interim Financial Report Q3 2026' with '4 November 2026' present in the financial calendar. One figure that a web summary offered was refused: a claim that the facility cuts Pandora's carbon footprint by 17%. The exact strings '17%' and '17 percent' each return zero hits in the saved CNBC bytes, so the figure was not printed. Rapaport's report of the same opening was read as a second trade account and carries the same USD 150 million, 50% and 60 million figures; it adds no figure the release does not have. The archive was checked by opening every hit rather than counting: a search of content/articles.json for Pandora returns four articles, all opened, covering a North America appointment on 5 August 2026, a third executive seat on 10 August 2026, a copyright suit on 16 September 2026 and a passing mention in a Signet piece of 6 August 2026. A search for Vietnam returns four more, all opened, covering a certificate scandal, a Forty-Seventh Street profile, a Luk Fook quarter and a counterfeit-footwear piece. None covers a Pandora plant, a capital expenditure or a capacity figure, so the verdict is NEW: period not applicable, first manufacturing story on this company in this archive.
Sources
- Pandora opens world's largest fine jewellery crafting facility, Pandora A/S 1 October 2026
- Jewelry giant Pandora is getting in on lab-grown diamonds and hoping a new Vietnam plant helps growth in Asia, CNBC 2 October 2026
- Pandora Lauches New Jewelry-Manufacturing Facility in Vietnam, Rapaport News 1 October 2026
- Financial calendar, Pandora A/S 2 October 2026