Technology

Samsung Mobile introduces international handset range to Sri Lanka

Samsung Mobile intends to launch 30 GSM models ranging from Entry-Color, Entry Color FM range, Multi media series, Touch Phones, Messaging series and Business phones in the local market.

This much awaited move will witness the entire range of sophisticated Samsung mobiles made accessible to every Sri Lankan and will cover every possible communications need.

K. Shankar Narayan, Country Head - Samsung Sri Lanka

Samsung, a world leader in consumer electronics, has now become the No. 1 choice for state-of-the-art mobile phones the world over. Specifically recognised for their advanced features and durability, Samsung mobile phones offer the latest technology coupled with long term value.

H.C Ryu, Vice President Sales-Marketing-Product, Samsung Electronics SW Asia, Digital Communications, HQ Korea, commented on the company's decision to enter the Sri Lankan market in a big way: 'We are delighted to make this announcement about our decision to introduce our entire mobile phone range to Sri Lanka.

We feel this is an interesting and optimal time to make an entry into the local market, because the economy is poised for an upward surge in the coming months and Samsung Mobile would like to establish an edge in the market. Our mobile phone range has always met with a great reception in Sri Lanka and we are confident about the prospects for the complete range of 30 new products that will now be available in the country. Our customers can expect international after-sales service standards at soon to be put up exclusive mobile service centres island- wide.

Samsung holds a track record for launching mobile phones that offer an attractive retinue of features and functionality, which has made Samsung handsets the first choice across all age groups.

Available across a wide ranging budget and scoring high on looks and intelligence, Samsung mobile phones offer enhanced communication and entertainment features that delights users.

K. Shankar Narayan, Country Head - Samsung Sri Lanka, said.

The mobile phone segment in Sri Lanka is poised for an exciting growth as the consumers here are well versed with the latest trend and technology in mobile industry as Sri Lankans are globe trotters. Our plan is inject dynamism into the market place with innovative marketing campaigns and special focus on channel relationship.

Samsung Mobile also intends to make a special effort in the realm of retail marketing initiatives which will attract customers and showcase how Samsung mobile phones are exclusive. While emphasizing on the channel strategy Narayan said that, Samsung mobile phones will be imported and distributed through the company's National Distribution partner and sold through Exclusive Dealers who are entitled to offer the Samsung global warranty to customers. We are also in talks with the leading telecom operators of SL and expect to forge a strong mutual relationship with them very soon.

Brandix leads the way with new-concept Chemical Leasing

In line with its environmental pledge, top apparel exporter to work with UNIDO to promote sustainable management of chemicals.

Sri Lanka's Brandix Group has become the first apparel manufacturer in the country to trial Chemical Leasing (ChL), a new concept methodology to promote more efficient and sustainable management of chemicals in manufacturing processes.

UNIDO Representative and Director of the National Cleaner Production Centre Sena Peiris (left) and Janaka Gamage, CEO of A&E Lanka (Pvt) Ltd at the signing of the Letter of Intent.

The concept, promoted worldwide by the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO) envisages converting suppliers of chemicals from sellers of products to providers of a service, whereby they sell the functions performed by their chemicals, and functional units become the main basis for payment.

This makes efficient consumption of chemicals a priority for their supplier, because the chemicals consumed become a cost rather than a revenue factor.

The end result is a reduction of excessive use of chemicals that ultimately benefits the environment, the company said.

This initiative will contribute to environmental sustainability initiatives that revolve around the Group's pledge to reduce its carbon footprint by as much as 30 per cent by 2012, Iresha Somarathna, Head of Environmental and Energy Management at Brandix said, pointing out that the Chemical Leasing concept, though in its early stages, would set an example for other companies seeking to become more environment-friendly.

The pilot application of Chemical Leasing is to take place at American & Efird (A&E), the Brandix Group's world class thread manufacturing company.

A Letter of Intent (LoI) under which UNIDO would provide expert guidance and facilitate the process between the company's German supplier of chemicals and A&E was signed in Colombo recently for this purpose.

Elaborating on the concept of Chemical Leasing, Somarathna said: 'Traditionally, chemicals are sold to customers, who become owners of the substances and therefore responsible for their use and disposal.

Their suppliers have a clear economic interest in increasing the amount of chemicals sold.'

'Under the Chemical Leasing business model, the customer pays for the benefits obtained from the chemical, not for the substance itself.

As a result, the economic success of the supplier is not linked with product turnover anymore. Chemical consumption becomes a cost rather than a revenue factor for the chemicals supplier, who will try to optimise the use of the chemical and improve the conditions for recycling in order to reduce the amount consumed.'

He said the adoption of the new concept could result in a reduction in chemical consumption of between 20 and 30 per cent, lowering production costs and delivering a tangible benefit to the environment.

At A&E, the Chemical Leasing concept is expected to be adopted in respect of chemicals used in the lubrication of thread, dyeing, effluent treatment and water treatment, Somarathna disclosed.

AVIVA NDB Wealth Planners equipped with laptops

AVIVA NDB Insurance, in another forward thinking step that has become a hallmark of the Company's recent transformation, has commenced empowering the first batch of its sales force known as Wealth Planners by equipping them with laptops. This will keep them abreast of rapidly advancing technology and enable the Wealth Planners to serve customers with greater speed and efficiency.

First batch of AVIVA NDB Wealth Planners who received laptops recently.

With the aid of a laptop, Wealth Planners would be able to instantly design the financial solution that meets the unique needs of a customer, using technology to strengthen their business relationships, enhancing their service beyond customer expectations.

AVIVA NDB Wealth Planners are trained to meet both Life and General insurance needs of customers and the laptops will help them to handle the entire spectrum of insurance solutions an individual is likely to require.

Using the specially developed user-friendly software installed in their laptops, AVIVA NDB Wealth Planners can instantly analyse and identify the financial planning requirements of a customer, immediately propose multiple solutions that fulfil those needs and design a customised insurance plan to help customers to get the maximum benefit.

Explaining the advantages to both the Wealth Planner and the customer, Shah Rouf, Managing Director said: "With the aid of a laptop, Wealth Planners are also able to maintain up-to-date profiles of their clients.

This facilitates a closer and more effective business relationship that significantly helps to make customers feel special - fulfilling global Aviva's brand promise 'No one recognizes you like Aviva.'

Technology stars top ranking of brand value

Google was crowned the world's most valuable brand on Wednesday by a research firm that found technology firms dominate when it comes to how much a name is worth in today's markets.

Google, IBM, Apple and Microsoft topped global stalwarts Coca-Cola, McDonald's, and Marlboro in a Top Ten brand value list packed with seven technology companies. Google's brand was worth more than 114 billion dollars, a 14 percent climb from 2009, according to the annual Millward Brown Optimor "BrandZ Top 100 Most Valuable Global Brands" report.

US technology titan IBM saw its "brand value" surge 30 percent to 86 billion dollars while the worth of Apple's name climbed 32 percent to 83 billion dollars, according to the report.

Factors taken into consideration in the ranking include customer loyalty and opinions regarding brands and how they influence earnings.

Microsoft ranked fourth with its brand valued at slightly more than 76 billion dollars, just ahead of the nearly 68 billion dollars that Coca-Cola's brand was said to be worth.

China Mobile, General Electric, and Vodafone claimed the eighth through tenth spots respectively.

Social-networking powerhouse Facebook made it onto a separate Top Twenty technology brands list for the first time with its company name value at 5.5 billion dollars.

Electronics powerhouse Samsung saw the largest jump in brand value, soaring 80 percent from the previous year to 11.3 billion dollars.

"Technology brands demonstrated their pervasiveness in our daily lives," Millward Brown said in a release.

"Use of social media was a key trend across many of the successful brands." The overall value of the Top 100 brands rose four percent to more than two trillion dollars, according to Millward Brown, which specializes in advertising, marketing communications, media and brand equity research.

"This ranking has elevated the importance of building brands among some of the world's most successful companies," said Millward Brown global chief executive Eileen Campbell.

"CEOs and CFOs around the world should be asking their brand and marketing teams how they can leverage brand to both protect and grow the business."

An investor who put their money into a Brandz portfolio five years ago would have earned a double-digit return as opposed to losing cash with a set of stocks based on the S&P 500 index, according to Millward Brown.

"In the past, many companies were quick to cut their marketing spend during a down economy," said Joanna Seddon, head of Millward Brown Optimor.

(AFP)

Dialog Telekom to become Dialog Axiata

Sri Lanka's flagship telecommunications service provider, Dialog Telekom PLC, will change its corporate name to Dialog Axiata PLC later this year.

The change in corporate name follows in step with the company's majority shareholder changing its Corporate Name and Identity in 2009, from Telekom Malaysia International Bhd to Axiata Group Berhard.

The 'Dialog' brand name and logo will remain unchanged. A company spokesman further confirmed that there had been no change to the shareholding structure of the Dialog Telekom Group.

The change, which is limited to the corporate name of the entity, is subject to approval from the company's shareholders and the Registrar-General of Companies. Accordingly the name change is likely to come into effect later in the year.

Axiata (pronounced: Ah-ze-ah-tah), the majority shareholder of Dialog, is one of the largest Telecommunications companies in Asia with a subscriber base of over 100 million customers.

Amazon Web Services launches Asia Pacific Region for CloudComputing Platform

Amazon Web Services LLC (AWS), a subsidiary of Amazon.com, Inc., announced the launch of its first Asia Pacific Region. Asia Pacific-based businesses or global businesses with customers based in Asia can now leverage the AWS suite of infrastructure web services to build their businesses and run their applications in the cloud. Prior to today, the AWS platform has been available from datacenters in the U.S. and Europe. The first AWS Asia Pacific Region (located in Singapore) is now open and any business or software developer can sign up and get started at http://aws.amazon.com.

Before AWS launched in 2006, businesses would take on the massive capital investment of building their own infrastructure or contract with a vendor for a fixed amount of datacenter capacity that they might or might not use.

This choice meant either paying for wasted capacity or having to worry that the amount of capacity they forecasted was insufficient to keep pace with their growth. Businesses spent time and money managing their own datacenter or a co-location facility, which meant time not spent on growing their actual business or differentiating their offering for customers.

When it launched in 2006, AWS offered a completely new way to run virtually any business that used technology-incur no up-front expenses or long-term commitments, turn capital expense into variable operating expense, pay only for what you use, add or shed resources as quickly as you wish, free up scarce engineering resources from the undifferentiated heavy lifting of running your own infrastructure-all without sacrificing operational performance, reliability, or security. "One of the most frequent and resounding requests over the last year has been for AWS to launch an Asia Pacific presence.

We've heard it from Asia Pacific companies already using AWS in our US datacenters; we've heard it from our U.S. and European customers wanting to better serve Asia Pacific end-users; and we've heard it loud and clear from Asia Pacific businesses who preferred to wait to leverage the AWS infrastructure platform until we had a datacenter presence in Asia," said Andy Jassy, Senior Vice President of Amazon Web Services.

(BSW)

SLT, Sanasa Development Bank in communication solution

Sri Lanka Telecom (SLT), the country's number one integrated telecommunications service provider entered into an agreement with the Sanasa Development Bank Ltd. (SDBL), to provide data communications solutions to its head office and branch offices located around the country.

The agreement was signed by Ajantha Seneviratne, Chief Marketing and Sales Officer, SLT and Nimal J.B. Mamaduwa, General Manager/CEO of SDBL recently.

SLT is now the principal communication solutions provider for SDBL. Under the agreement, SLT will provide voice, data and internet solutions to SDBL.

This will consist of a total voice communication solution through SLT Megaline (wired PSTN) and SLT Citylink CDMA connections as well as dedicated high capacity digital E1 connectivity.

This facilitates futuristic solutions with seamless connectivity for communications between the head office and its branch network of 60 offices.

SLT will provide mission critical data services with seamless connectivity for the bank's 60 branch offices located island-wide through its advanced IP/VPN (Internet Protocol Virtual Private Network) solution.

High-bandwidth connectivity solutions is also provided to the Bank's Head office through SLT Metro Ethernet, which offers an array of services that ensures the smooth functioning of enterprise-wide applications, supporting high access rates of up to 1 Gbps, as well as offering high quality of service and securing connectivity.

Point to point connectivity will also be provided to extension centres.

Broadband internet access will be provided through high capacity internet leased lines as well as ADSL connectivity to branch offices, providing connectivity to SLTNet, the largest ISP in the country.

Giving his views on the agreement, Mr. Nimal J.B. Mamaduwa, General Manager/CEO of SDBL said, 'We have enjoyed a long term mutually beneficial relationship with Sri Lanka Telecom, and we selected them as our principal telecommunications partner because after having experienced the reliability and premium quality of their voice communication services firsthand, we feel very confident in entrusting the rest of our communication needs to them.

CBL implements Oracle technology solutions

Ceylon Biscuits Ltd. (CBL) has developed and implemented a sales force automation solution based on Oracle Mobile Lite Server, Oracle Database Lite Client and Oracle Database Enterprise Edition with Oracle Diagnostics and Oracle Tuning packs, to enhance the overall productivity of its manufacturing businesses' sales infrastructure.

CBL, with its various foods, chocolates and confectionary brands, caters to 110,000 outlets across Sri Lanka serviced by a large sales force.

This deployment enables its sales force to perform various sales related tasks from remote locations, in a centralised and automated environment, increasing its productivity and overall operational efficiency.

CBL engaged DMS Software Technologies, an Oracle PartnerNetwork Platinum partner, to fulfil the deployment. The readily available support and training provided by DMS Software Technologies helped to cut short the time to deployment.

'CBL recognizes the importance of leveraging technology to enhance productivity in all sectors of the business.

Our sales force automation application deployed on the Oracle Database is a perfect match for our business. It has given us an edge over our competitors by allowing our sales team to work more efficiently.

We are now capable of making key strategic decisions quickly and effectively. We are capable of streamlining our sales force and focusing our marketing strategy based on real time data. Constant innovation has been the hallmark of our business strategy. That is one of the reasons we went with Oracle.

Oracle Sri Lanka and DMS have been extremely helpful in getting this project off the ground by providing us with all the support and training required,' said Rasith Wickramasingha, Senior Technical Manager, Ceylon Biscuit Limited.

Oracle Database along with database options has provided CBL with better performance, a reliable information and manageable IT infrastructure, enabling it to deliver the highest quality of service at a lower cost. The tuning pack will enable CBL to automate its entire application tuning process, extremely cost effectively and easily.

'The diagnostics pack will provide enterprise-wide performance reporting which will free database administrators from this complex and time consuming task. In addition, it will offer a centralized performance repository that will significantly simplify the task of managing CBL's large sets of databases.

Renault boss to bid for new mandate

Renault chief Carlos Ghosn on Friday will seek another mandate to steer the French car maker through difficult economic times.

Ghosn, who also heads Japanese auto manufacturer Nissan, was appointed to Renault's board of directors in 2002. In 2005, he took charge of Renault operations and was last year named president of the group.

He is expected to ask Renault shareholders on Friday to extend his mandate on the board of directors for another four years, after which the newly elected board would re-appoint him president and chief executive.Ghosn, born in Brazil to a Lebanese family, arrived at Renault after acquiring a reputation as a "cost killer" at Nissan, which he revived from rapid decline.

He is likely to draw on these skills again to cope with increasingly tough conditions for car makers, as car bonus schemes begin to be withdrawn across Europe - its biggest market - during the course of this year.Government stimulus schemes have been propping up sales of the group, including in the first quarter when revenues jumped 28.4 percent to 9.072 billion euros (12 billion dollars).

That boon is likely to fade in the second quarter.The group said Tuesday that it expected "the economic environment to remain difficult in 2010 with a European market that could decline by 10 percent on the total industry volume of 2009." Hard hit by the criThe French state is Renault's biggest shareholder, with a 15-percent stake.

(AFP)