HSBC, British Council recognise young entrepreneurs
The HSBC Youth Enterprise Awards (YEA) 2012 presented by the British Council was held at Hilton Colombo amidst distinguished guests including Higher Education Sri Lanka Secretary Dr. Sunil Nawaratne, British Council Country Director Tony Reilly and HSBC Sri Lanka and the Maldives Chief Executive Officer Nick Nicolaou.
Having been assessed through multiple rounds of workshops and evaluations, the three finalists presented their business ideas in front of an expert panel headed by lead judge Prof. Chandra Embuldeniya together with Orion Development (Pvt.) Ltd. CEO Jeevan Gnanam and Virtusa Corporation Vice President and General Manager Madu Ratnayake, at the YEA finale.
The winners of this year’s YEA finale are: (1) Winner: Keeriwala Gamage Sujani for project Kithul Corner (2) First Runner Up : Group application (Kurukulasooriyage Danuka Dilshan Perera) for project U-grow and (3) Second Runner Up: Group application (Yapage Viraj Madusanka) for project Carbon Nano Tubes (CNT) .
HSBC Sri Lanka and the Maldives CEO Nick Nicolaou said, “We are delighted by the enthusiasm and the ideas presented by these young contestants. It is encouraging for all of us to see how their education and natural habitat has presented them with ideas and opportunities that are commercially viable. I congratulate them all. It is the youth of Sri Lanka who will now have the task of steering the country towards economic development and this platform fits well with their aspirations and national agenda, hence we are happy to have gathered around for the sec- ond consecutive year to recognise and reward the young entrepreneurs of tomorrow.”
The winning idea ‘Kithul Corner’ was presented by Keeriwala Gamage Sujani who walked away with a reward of Rs.500,000/- as seed capital to further her idea into a potential business. Having hailed from an area that is famous for Kithul products, Deniyaya, her idea was to create a one-stop-shop for sweet meats and ornamental handicrafts made out of kithul and kithul timber, thereby creating a centre of excellence for ‘Kithul’ based produce by engaging the local community .
‘Kithul Corner’, her business centre situated in Deniyaya under the theme of ‘Dealing with nature’ promises to offer a one-stop-shop for kithul based produce and offers both local and foreign tourists a true ecofriendly experience.
Project U-grow, having emerged first runner up presented the judges with an idea of a system that is capable of forecasting the optimal production plan for farmers, mostly in the field of vegetable and fruit cultivation. It also contains a website which offers all the latest techniques and knowledge required for farming hence creating a neural network of information. As a result, farmers will be able to identify best production capabilities through seasonal tuning whilst considering other factors such as weather, soil, geography, demand, etc. The team received a cash reward of Rs.200,000 as seed capital.
The second runner up, Project Carbon Nano Tubes, presented an idea and the key presenter said, “Carbon Nano Tubes (CNT) from Sri Lankan vein graphite (the only vein graphite in the world). The market share for CNT is $ 2.1 billion per year and it is 28% from the world’s nano products. We have 99.9 pure raw materials (graphite) in Kahatagaha and Bogala mines. Due to its strength and very good electric conducting capacity, CNT could be applied to many applications from tennis rackets to computer nano processors (electrical circuits, electrical cables and wires, paper batteries, solar cells, hydrogen storage, ultra capacitors, radar absorption) and can become a high potential business in future technology. We can also look at having patent rights and be the only CNT producer from Sri Lankan vein graphite. We hope producing CNT in Sri Lanka will open many industrial opportunities and could be termed as a multi-million dollar business, with market domination due to the unique and pure raw materials.” The team received a cash reward of Rs.100,000 for further development.
British Council Country Director Tony Reilly said, “Governments increasingly consider entrepreneurship and innovation to be the cornerstones of a competitive national economy. This is certainly true for both Sri Lanka and the UK. And universities have a key role to play in nurturing next generation entrepreneurs. The HSBC-British Council Youth Enterprise Awards, now in their second year, set out to identify and nurture entrepreneurial talent within Sri Lanka’s universities.”