Port City in Presidential spotlight

President Mahinda Rajapaksa and Chinese President Xi Jinping inspecting the model structure of the Colombo Port City project at the official commissioning ceremony yesterday. The China-financed project will cost $ 1.4 billion – Pic by Sudath Silva     

Otara Gunewardena exits Odel to enjoy Embark

Odel founder Otara Gunewardena in a statement yesterday said her exit was to enable the organisation to be taken to the next level by the dynamic and fast growing Softlogic Holdings Plc and for her to focus more on another passion – Embark.

Following is the full text of Otara’s statement:
I wish to inform the public that I, along with my family members Ajit Gunewardene and Ruchi Gunewardene, have disposed all of our shares in Odel Plc this morning to the Softlogic Group.
I believe that the sale of our shares to the Softlogic Group is in the best interest of Odel Plc, and a natural progression to its continued growth. Having being nurtured from a simple retail operation from a car boot into one of the largest retail businesses in Sri Lanka during the last 25 years, Odel Plc now needs to move to the next level of retailing in order to be competitive, locally and globally.
This requires the entry of a larger player with a deep commitment to retailing, which I believe can best be provided by the Softlogic Group, which has a proven history of dynamism and perhaps an unrivalled track record of such operations in Sri Lanka.

Apart from the overall interests of the growth of Odel Plc, my decision to sell out of the company is also based on my personal desire to focus on another passion I dearly treasure in life: the pursuit of a mission to ensure the welfare of animals and the development of the Embark brand which funds such programs. The sale of my shares in Odel Plc will hopefully provide me with more time and energy to devote to these activities in the future.

I wish to state that I will continue my association with Odel Plc over the foreseeable future, and will provide all assistance and cooperation during the period of transition.
In conclusion, I wish to express my sincere thanks to all my shareholders, customers, stakeholders and all well-wishers who have made this a truly wonderful journey. I hope that you will continue to support Odel Plc in the future.

Apple unveils watch, larger iPhones in bid to retake innovation crown

CUPERTINO Calif. (Reuters): Apple Inc unveiled a watch, two larger iPhones and a mobile payments service on Tuesday as Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook seeks to revive the technology company’s reputation as a wellspring of innovation.
The first new product to be developed and introduced under Cook’s reign is a timepiece tethered to the iPhone that will combine health and fitness tracking with communications. It will price at $ 349 and go on sale in early 2015.
First impressions were mixed. Some expected Apple to blow away the current competition but others warned the fact that it requires a paired iPhone may limit its sales.

Starting at $349 – $50 more than the cheapest version of the iPhone 6 with a contract, the lofty price tag may also keep some consumers on the sidelines. It could go up to more than $1,000 for higher-end editions, IDC analyst Danielle Levitas said.
The Apple Watch can receive phone calls and messages, play music, serve as a digital wallet to pay for goods and monitor heart rates via special sensors. The watches will come in three collections, including a sport edition and an upscale line coated in 18-karat gold.
“People are kind of scratching their heads on this watch, especially the fact that to successfully use the watch and to take advantage of its capabilities, you also have to have an iPhone,” said Daniel Morgan, vice president at Synovus Trust Company in Atlanta. “I don’t know if they’re in the right direction with this iWatch.”
Still, rival watch and wearable device makers will keep a wary eye on Apple, which upended the music industry and drove once-dominant phone makers like Blackberry to the brink of extinction.
Sony Corp, Samsung, LG Electronics Inc and Qualcomm Inc have already launched smartwatches, albeit without much success.
“Not the knockout some were anticipating. A bit gimmicky also on the health end of the wearable bands market,” said Jon Cox, an analyst of Swiss watch companies at brokerage Kepler Cheuvreux in Zurich.
“Not as cool as I feared. Nick Hayek is probably sleeping a little easier tonight,” Cox said, referring to the chief executive of Swatch Group.
Shares of the company closed just a tad higher after having risen almost 5 percent before executives trotted out the watch. The stock tends to rise in the run-up to a major product launch, and come under selling pressure afterward as investors cash out.
The watch is unlikely to increase Apple’s top-line. Estimates vary but IDC expects total global demand of 42 million smartwatches in 2015. Apple sells that many or more iPhones in a good quarter.
But the pressure was on for the world’s largest tech company to wow on Tuesday, after a years-long drought of products beyond new iPhones and iPads. The prospect of a new gadget attracted a broader swathe of attendees than usual, with celebrities, fashion industry editors and even healthcare executives rounding out the mostly tech-industry crowd.

Lankan-born Rajan Anandan is India’s top MNC CEO

Sri Lankan-born Rajan Anandan, the Head of Google India, has been ranked as India’s Top Multi National Corporation (MNC) Chief Executive Officer. 
Rajan is the son of endurance swimmer and multi-Guinness record holder, the late Kumar Anandan, and Manel Anandan (nee Samaraweera). He is an MIT and Stanford alumni, and previously worked for McKinsey, Microsoft & Dell, and is a Founding Partner of Blue Ocean Ventures.
Rajan has beaten some of the top and senior names in India whilst Google at brands level had superseded some of the more established global brands as well as per the ranking done by Economic Times of India.

Here is the impressive power list of Top 10 MNC CEOs in India:
1. Rajan Anandan, Head, Google India
2. D. Shivakumar, CEO Pepsico India
3 Sunil Kaushal, CEO Standard Chartered India
4. Sanjiv Mehta, CEO Hindustan Unilever
5. Martin Pieters, MD and CEO Vodafone India
6 Shinzo Nakanishi, CEO Maruti Suzuki
7. Kalpana Morparia, CEO JP Morgan India
8 Naina Lal Kidwai, Country Head HSBC India
9. Parmit Jhaveri, CEO Citi India
10. B.D. Park, President Samsung India

Bloomberg to add Sri Lanka to its international release of Economic Forecasts

Sri Lanka’s profile for business and investment will get a big boost shortly when the world famous and influential premier source for business and financial market news, Bloomberg includes the country into its global service providing economic forecast. 

The Bloomberg’s Economic Forecasts (ECFC) tracks eight macro-economic indicators including GDP, inflation, unemployment, current account, budget deficit and interest rates. At present Bloomberg ECFC coverage has over 80 countries and territories.

“Very soon we will be including Sri Lanka in our ECFC service which is available in our Bloomberg Terminal subscribed by over 300,000 worldwide,” Bloomberg’s FX Application Specialist Stephen Jonathan told the Daily FT on the sidelines of the Invest Sri Lanka Forum in New York, which he moderated. ECFC is also available via www.bloombergbriefs.com.

Plans to include Sri Lanka were shared by Jonathan during his opening remarks at the New York Forum attended by over 150 US based fund managers and investors.
He said that data on Sri Lanka will be updated as and when required especially when new information is released.

The New York Forum last week as well the series of Investor Foras held in several parts of the world – London, Singapore, Dubai, Hong Kong, Mumbai were in partnership with Bloomberg.

Microsoft to cut 18,000 jobs this year as it chops Nokia

Reuters: Microsoft Chief Executive Officer Satya Nadella kicked off one of the largest layoffs in tech history on Thursday, hoping to reshape the aging PC industry titan into a nimbler rival to Apple and Google, and jolt a culture at the company that is used to protecting its existing Windows and Office franchises.
Microsoft Corp said on Thursday it will slash up to 18,000 jobs, or 14% of its workforce, over the next 12 months as it almost halves the size of its newly acquired Nokia phone business and tries to become a cloud-computing and mobile-friendly software company.
The larger-than-expected cuts are the deepest in the software giant’s 39-year history and come five months into Nadella’s tenure.Beyond the Nokia reductions, Nadella gave few clues about where the ax will fall or what areas will receive more funding.

One source briefed on the cuts said a major victim would be the 175-strong Xbox Entertainment Studios unit, which will start to wind down efforts to create original content. But it will continue to work on its highest-profile project, a filmed version of the blockbuster ‘Halo’ videogame.
Nadella said he will answer questions from employees at a town hall meeting at Microsoft headquarters in Redmond, Washington, on Friday and flesh out his plans publicly after Microsoft’s quarterly earnings report on July 22.
“We will simplify the way we work to drive greater accountability, become more agile and move faster,” Nadella wrote to employees in a memo made public early Thursday. “We plan to have fewer layers of management, both top down and sideways, to accelerate the flow of information and decision making.”
The size of the cuts were welcomed by Wall Street, which was critical of the Nokia acquisition and viewed Microsoft as bloated under previous CEO Steve Ballmer, topping 127,000 in staff after absorbing Nokia earlier this year.

“This is about double what the Street was expecting,” said Daniel Ives, an analyst at FBR Capital Markets. “Nadella is clearing the decks for the new fiscal year. He is cleaning up part of the mess that Ballmer left.”
Microsoft shares rose 1.8% to $ 44.88 on Nasdaq, reaching their highest since the technology stock boom of 2000.

3 Questions to Ask Yourself Daily as You Roll Out of Bed

The morning is a powerful time to frame your mindset for the day ahead.


One of the best lifestyle practices you can get into as an entrepreneur is to start the day with some bold and optimistic questions to set the tone for how you’re going to approach what comes next. This helps you to be prepared for opportunities throughout the day by keeping your eyes open to possibility when there are inevitable challenges.


Here are three questions you should ask yourself every morning as soon as you wake up to help you be a rock star entrepreneur.


1. Who can I help today? There’s a famous Plato quote -- “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle.” It’s easy to wake up and have your very first thoughts be, “I didn’t get enough sleep” or “I’m so busy … how will I get it all done?”


While those thoughts are perfectly normal, they’re not necessarily inspiring. Everyone has something to offer others. When you start your day asking how you can be of service, it is tantamount to you saying, “I’ve got something to offer. I’ve got something to give.”


That’s a more empowering place to come from in life: offering value. Spend a few minutes brainstorming ideas of ways you can help people and watch throughout the day as new opportunities to help will undoubtedly spring up.


2. What can I do better today? This can be as broad or specific as you want, but the point is to conceptualize what positive actions you can take today to be just a little bit better than the day before.


Did you slack off and skip the gym when you know you really needed to go? How can you take a positive step to ensure that the gym happens today? Lose your temper with someone on the staff and you wish you would’ve handled better? Brainstorm how you can approach that person today with a better understanding, and if necessary, an apology for your bad behavior.

Luxury hotel chain Ritz-Carlton ties up with Krrish

Luxury hotel chain Ritz-Carlton has signed a management agreement with Indian real estate company Krrish on a $ 650 million hotel project in Sri Lanka’s capital, a top official said yesterday.
Titled ‘Krrish Square,’ the project will have four high-rise ultra-luxurious towers and will be envisaged as a vertical city. Three of them will house high-end residential apartments.
The fourth tower will be the tallest tower with 85 levels complete with a high-end retail complex, commercial office outlets and a seven-star hotel, which will be managed by Ritz Carlton. “Krrish has informed us that they have tied up with Ritz-Carlton and we believe it will be to manage their hotel,” Investment Promotion Minister Lakshman Yapa Abeywardene told reporters.
However, the project has been dogged with controversy after the company repeatedly delayed lease payments to the Government, prompting the Investment Promotion Ministry to impose a 12% tax and threaten to end the contract.

The agreement for the Krrish project was initially signed in August 2012 with the money to be paid in full by January 2013. Yet a final payment of Rs. 690 million ($ 5.3 million) is still pending, with the company assuring it will be handed over to the Government on 15 July.
“If the payment is not made, then we will cancel the contract in September,” the Minister added.
Nonetheless, he denied the delay of the project, which was initially expected to open in 2016, being a disadvantage to the Government, which owns the land.
“We have made a car park into a money spinner,” he joked, insisting the Government had not made losses in the deal.
Krrish is hoping to cash in on Sri Lanka’s lucrative tourism industry, which has boomed since the end of the three-decade war in 2009.
The Investment Promotion Ministry estimates 8,000 rooms will be added to the existing 24,000 by end 2015, creating sufficient accommodation for the 2.5 million tourists targeted by the Government in 2016.
A second luxury hotel project by Hong Kong company Shangri-la in the southern Sri Lankan town is “70% complete” Yapa noted and likely to begin operations in early 2015.
In the first six months of this year, a total of 727,353 tourists arrived in the island, marking a 24.6% increase from the 583,573 who visited during the corresponding period in 2013.
Most of the tourist arrivals were from Western Europe, with 223,810 tourists visiting in the first six months of this year recording a 17% increase over corresponding 2013 figures, the Sri Lanka Tourism Development Authority (SLTDA) said in its latest report on Wednesday.

Aitken Spence signs BOI deal for new $ 100 m hotel with Spanish chain

Aitken Spence PLC has entered into an agreement with the Board of Investment of Sri Lanka (BOI) to set up a five-star luxury resort in Ahungalla.
This agreement was signed by BOI Chairman Dr. Lakshman Jayaweera and the Directors of Aitken Spence Malin Hapugoda and Vipula Goonathilake.

Aitken Spence PLC will launch the first business model involving the Southern Highway and the Mattala Airport by investing in a $ 100 million beach resort in Ahungalla to be managed by an international hotel chain. The five-storey, 500-roomed, five-star luxury resort, which will be managed by RIU Hotels, Spain, would also be a first for the Spanish chain, being their inaugural project in the Asia Pacific region.
“The timing of the hotel’s opening will be right since the Southern Highway to Hambantota is expected to reach completion by then and we have the Mattala Airport facility already in place, giving us the perfect mix for our business model.  Aitken Spence has always encouraged infrastructure development in the country and our investment is proof of our confidence and support of the Government’s development plans,” said Deputy Chairman of the Group Rajan Brito.
The Aitken Spence management is also of the opinion that the private sector needs to develop business modes of this nature, which are in line with the Government’s vision for the country’s development.
BOI stated: “The BOI is very pleased that this project will be started in Ahungalla. The policy of the Government is to get 2.5 million tourist arrivals by 2016. Hence hotel room capacity needs to be increased to meet growing demand.”
The project will also be unique in its concept, since it will introduce charter flights to the country. The hotel which would cater to high end customers looking for long stay vacations will arrive on Boeing 787 Dreamliner charters which can carry up to 200-300 passengers at a time. RIU Hotels is an all-inclusive model which has seen international success across 107 properties managed by them in 16 countries.

Sinhala numerals in Unicode 7.0

The Unicode Consortium has just announced the release of version 7.0 of the Unicode Standard. Unicode 7.0 includes Sinhala numerals.
“The Unicode Standard supports the interchange, processing, and display of the written texts of the diverse languages of the world and in addition supports classical and historical texts of many written language,” the website www.unicode.org stated.

The ICT Agency of Sri Lanka (ICTA) initiated research in partnership with the University of Colombo, School of Computing. Extensive research was carried out on inscriptions on walls of temples, on numbers in horoscopes, on Ola leaf paging and the historical evolution of Sinhala numerals was studied. Sinhala numerals were also correlated with numerations used in other countries. The research yielded the fact that five different types of numerations were used in Sinhala. Of these numerations, two sets were in use in the 20th century. These are: (1) ‘Lith Ilakkam’ which include a zero and had been used in astrological calculations and in numbering pages of Ola leaf books, and (2) ‘Sinhala Ilakkam’ or Sinhala archaic numerals used to express simple numbers. The latter had been used in the Kandyan convention signed in 1815.
Lith Ilakkam, which includes the zero concept are included in the main Sinhala code page of Unicode 7.0, and Sinhala Ilakkam are included in the supplementary area.

Oracle becomes second largest Cloud SaaS company in the world

• Q4 SaaS and PaaS subscriptions up 25% to $ 322 million, Q4 IaaS subscription revenue up 13% to $ 128 million

Oracle Corporation has announced that fiscal 2014 Q4 total revenues were up 3% to $ 11.3 billion. Software and Cloud revenues were up 4% to $ 8.9 billion.
GAAP Cloud software-as-a-service (SaaS) and platform-as-a-service (PaaS) revenues were up 25% to $ 322 million, while non-GAAP SaaS and PaaS revenues were up 23% to $ 327 million. In addition, Cloud infrastructure-as-a-service (IaaS) revenues were up 13% to $ 128 million.
New software licenses revenues were unchanged at $ 3.8 billion. Software license updates and product support revenues were up 7% to $ 4.7 billion. Overall hardware systems revenues were up 2% to $ 1.5 billion with hardware systems products up 2% to $ 870 million, and hardware systems support up 2% to $ 596 million.
In Q4, both GAAP and non-GAAP earnings per share were lowered by $ 0.02 due to a non-operating loss caused by exchange rate changes in Venezuela. Furthermore, last year’s Q4 GAAP earnings per share increased $ 0.04 because of a $ 269 million acquisition price reduction.  As a result of these two factors, Q4 GAAP earnings per share were unchanged at $ 0.80 compared with last year, while GAAP net income was down 4% to $ 3.6 billion, and GAAP operating income was down 2% to  $4.9 billion. Q4 GAAP operating margin was 43% in the quarter.

Apple says sold well over 800 m mobile devices

Reuters: Apple Inc Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook, opening the iPhone maker’s annual developers’ conference on Monday, said the iPhone maker has sold more than 800 million mobile devices.
Some 130 million customers bought their first Apple mobile device in the past 12 months, Cook said.
Developers converged on the Moscone Center in downtown San Francisco to watch Cook and his lieutenants outline the latest tweaks and features new to its Macintosh computer and iOS mobile operating software.

How to Create a Attention-grabbing Powerful Presentation -Kadapila

Every entrepreneur, CEO, Manager will definitely have to do a presentation in their career.
But the presentation you did should be attention-grabbing; People should remember your presentation,
Even after months people should be talking about your presentation because it’s so mesmerizing.
The following are five techniques to capture and hold your audience’s attention throughout your presentation.

Cognitive Dissonance.

Carry on your presentation while your audiences guessing what you are really talking about. Hold their brains off balance by feeding bits of information as opposed to revealing your point early. For example you can build a graphic slide by slide like assembling a puzzle. Slowly reveal parts of your graphic briefly speak to each part and build your graphic so your point is revealed in the end.

Prepare a powerful opening –

Start your presentation with an Inspirational quote, intriguing question or a personal story and relate that to your presentation topic Remember the saying, “Facts tell and stories sell.”
Witticism perks up people as well

First-ever Sri Lanka Capital Markets Investor Forum kicks off in UK today

• Large contingent of around 50 from Sri Lanka in London for one-day event at Savoy Hotel
• Over 150 fund managers and investment bankers from UK to attend
• Central Bank Chief Cabraal to keynote Forum, showcasing post-war growth potential and investment opportunities
• Presentation by world’s largest asset manager BlackRock a key highlight in the event organised in association with London Stock Exchange and Bloomberg
• Heads and senior executives of 9 listed companies and 15 broking firms to woo more UK investments

By Nisthar Cassim
in London
The first-ever Sri Lanka Capital Markets Investor Forum kicks off today in London as the industry makes a concerted effort to woo fresh interests from the UK to the post-war resurgence in the country.
A large contingent of around 50 business leaders from private sector and capital markets is attending the event at Savoy Hotel, London along with several Government officials.
The full-day event is organised by the Securities and Exchange Commission and the Colombo Stock Exchange in association with the London Stock Exchange and Bloomberg.
As of yesterday around 150 UK fund managers, investment bankers and investors have registered to listen to the opportunities in Sri Lanka, which has shown considerable improvement in macro-economic fundamentals as well as rise in foreign direct and portfolio investments since the end of the war in May 2009.
A spokesman for the CSE described the extent of registrations as “unprecedented”.
The event will focus on the growth potential and opportunities available in the capital market as well as Sri Lanka in general.

Warren Buffett Teach kids financial literacy to spark entrepreneurship

Reuters: Billionaire investor Warren Buffett has a double life – as a cartoon character. In his ‘Secret Millionaires Club,’ an animated series online and on television, Buffett teaches a group of kids about financial literacy and entrepreneurship.
In real life, the club includes an annual ‘Grow Your Own Business Challenge’ for kids who come up with business ideas.
The winners were chosen on Monday: Beaux Up, a customisable bow tie business by 15-year-old Jake Johnson of North Carolina in the individual competition; and WiseGuide, an intergenerational online community, from Krystal and Allyson Graylin and Kei Chua from Seattle, Washington, in the team contest. The winners each received $ 5,000, and all finalists received 10 Berkshire Class B shares, worth $ 1,271 at the closing of the market on Monday.
Buffett, the third-richest person on the Forbes list of wealthiest people and the chairman and chief executive of conglomerate Berkshire Hathaway, took some time to talk to Reuters about kids, financial literacy and why he still bets big on the US economy. The questions and answers have been edited and condensed for length and clarity.
Q: Are you seeing any trends among the entries?
A: There’s a greater tech aspect to some of the entries than there was in the past. They know a lot at age 10 or 11 that I don’t know at age 83. They’re incorporating into their projects tech features now even more than a couple years ago.

Q: Are they changing your own feelings on the tech sector?
A: I’ve always said I don’t know enough about tech to compete with the rest of the world, and I don’t think I know enough to compete with a bunch of 12-year-olds.