Cloud Archives

February 28, 2024

During MWC Barcelona 2024, Huawei hosted a number of global operators, industry partners, and opinion leaders for discussions on future network-cloud-intelligence synergy at its “Advance Intelligence” showcase. The company aims to promote the intelligent digital transformation across industries, build a thriving industry ecosystem, accelerate the positive business cycle of 5G, and prepare for the upcoming 5.5G era.

Huawei’s booth in Hall 1 has been designed to imagine what an intelligent digital world with intelligent connectivity of everything would look like. The digital infrastructure of the future intelligent world will be deeply integrated into every aspect of our lives, industry, and society. These new business scenarios for people, homes, businesses, and vehicles will raise higher requirements for network capabilities. Huawei has showcased a full range of 5.5G, F5.5G, and Net5.5G products and solutions for multiple scenarios at MWC Barcelona 2024. It is committed to working with global operators and industry partners to embrace challenges and opportunities and lead the future intelligent world.

By the end of 2023, more than 300 5G commercial networks had been launched worldwide, serving more than 1.6 billion users. 5G development is now well underway, with the growth rate of global 5G users reaching seven times higher than that of 4G users in the same period. Operators using Huawei solutions ranked No. 1 regarding network experience during the 2023 testing by a well-known organization in key cities in Germany, Austria, and Netherlands. Huawei has also collaborated with world-leading operators and industry partners to find innovative solutions to meet higher requirements of new 5.5G applications and scenarios. Together, they have promoted 5.5G technology verification and network deployment, expanding the nascent 5.5G market.

Huawei has already helped operators start 5.5G commercial verification and testing in more than 20 cities around the world. The Middle East has formed a general consensus on 5.5G development, with all six members of the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) having completed 5.5G 10 Gbps rate verification and incubation of new services such as RedCap and passive IoT.

The three major operators in China’s mainland have all started 5.5G network deployment in major cities, to explore services for connected people, things, vehicles, industries, and homes. In Hong Kong, operators have also completed 5.5G 10 Gbps rate testing and verification in the C-band and mmWave and started to provision 5.5G FWA services.

In Europe, Finnish operators have concluded 5.5G technology verification on commercial networks, achieving a peak rate of greater than 10 Gbps, and verified the passive IoT technology. In Germany, operators operating on the 6 GHz band have also achieved a peak rate of 12 Gbps using multi-carrier techniques.

Huawei will also launch the industry’s first telecom foundation model at MWC. This foundation model will offer role-based and scenario-based intelligent applications to support industry demand for agile service provisioning, accurate user experience assurance, and efficiency O&M across domains. It will also help operators empower employees and improve user satisfaction to comprehensively boost network productivity.

5.5G is expected to see commercial launch in 2024, and Huawei has reaffirmed its commitment to working with operators around the world to explore the evolution to 5.5G. The company aims to help build ubiquitous networks that are efficient, collaborative, green, stable, and intelligent so that operators can deliver premium experience. Such industry collaboration will take intelligent digital transformation to deeper levels and lead us to an intelligent world faster.

Huawei’s enterprise business will unveil new intelligent digital solutions for 10 industries and a series of flagship products under the theme “Leading Infrastructure to Accelerate Industrial Intelligence”. The company is eager to join hands with its customers and partners around the world to explore innovations and practices in intelligent digital transformation. Huawei is committed to becoming the most reliable partner for intelligent digital transformation across industries.

Huawei’s device business will showcase a lineup of high-end, fashion-forward, and technology-driven flagship products at the event. Their booth is divided into scenario-based experience zones including on “Fashion Forward”, “Creation of Beauty”, and “Fitness & Health” which will focus on how Huawei’s solutions infuse daily life with new technologies and enrich scenario-based experiences. While continuing to invest in technology innovation in 2024, Huawei’s device team is committed to making further breakthroughs and building rich and personalized lifestyles for global consumers.

MWC Barcelona 2024 will be held from February 26 to February 29 in Barcelona, Spain. During the event, Huawei will showcase its latest products and solutions at stand 1H50 in Fira Gran Via Hall 1.

With the 2024 commercial launch of 5.5G, Huawei is collaborating with operators and partners around the world to pursue exciting new innovation in networks, cloud, and intelligence. Together, we will drive 5G business and foster a thriving industry ecosystem, creating a new era for intelligent digital transformation. For more information, please visit: https://carrier.huawei.com/en/events/mwc2024.

December 19, 2023

Virtusa, a global provider of digital strategy, digital engineering, and IT services and solutions, successfully concluded the Code to Cloud: DevOps with AWS training program, followed by an ambitious 98-minute AWS Rush Hour hackathon challenge in partnership with the University of Peradeniya (UOP) recently. With the world heralding the era of cloud computing, Virtusa ensured participating members of the Computer Society of UOP are equipped with the knowledge and skillset to aid them in gaining an advantage in the highly competitive IT job market at the conclusion of this training programme.

“Today, everything in the digital world is connected to the cloud in some way or another, and cloud computing has become a critical part of the IT industry,” Indika Wimalasuriya – Senior Systems Engineering Manager, Managed Services elaborated on the training programme. “According to Forbes, spending by businesses worldwide on cloud computing is forecast to top US$ 1 trillion for the first time in 2024[1], a global market trend that has directly contributed to an escalating demand for cloud computing professionals in the industry. As the most sought-after employer by fresh IT graduates in the country, we at Virtusa understand the role we must play in equipping these students with the necessary training and knowledge, so that they can explore such high demand job prospects in the immediate future.”

The 15-hour training programme was broken down into 10 individual sessions, and hosted remotely by a specialist tech panel from Virtusa Sri Lanka comprising Indika Wimalasuriya, who was joined by Kapila Sanjeewa – Associate Engineering Manager, Digital Engineering; Milinda Nandasena – Software Engineer – Managed Services; and Mohan Tharanga Edirisinghe – Senior Lead Software Engineer – Managed Services. The training programme was carried out as part of Virtusa’s Campus Reach initiative – an industry-academia partnership designed to carry out immersive student engagements such as visitations, internships and mentoring among other activities, with an overarching objective to meet future IT talent needs of Sri Lanka. Anniston Leo – Associate Consultant – Campus Hiring SL represented the Campus Reach initiative and supported the tech team in facilitating the training programme.

The training series covered key aspects of modern software development, where participants were provided with insights into DevOps principles, enabling them to explore diverse software architectures including serverless, and receive hands-on experience with AWS and Kubernetes. The program also delved into Infrastructure as Code (IaC) using Amazon CloudFormation, microservices development, and deployment with AWS tools, as well as CI/CD pipelines using Jenkins. The journey concluded with an exploration of serverless computing through AWS Lambda. This program equipped participants with the knowledge and experience needed to seamlessly transition code from development to the cloud.

With the conclusion of the training program, Virtusa organized assessments for the undergraduates, providing them with hands-on experience to address real-world problems. Following this, a hackathon titled “AWS Rush Hour: The 98-minute Challenge” was conducted on the university premises. The hackathon was a remarkable success; program participants were given an opportunity to meet their Virtusa specialist trainers in person, network, and more importantly, gain valuable industry insights.

To mark the conclusion of this initiative, an award ceremony was held, during which Virtusa presented certificates to individuals who successfully completed the training program. Certificates were also conferred upon the winners of the hackathon during an award ceremony, which was graciously attended by Prof. Saluka R. Kodituwakku, Senior Professor of Statistics and Computer Science at the University of Peradeniya. Prof. Kodituwakku expressed his gratitude to Team Virtusa, acknowledging their commitment and efforts in supporting young talent to thrive in their future careers. He deeply appreciated the individuals who dedicated their time and expertise to the event, ensuring that aspiring students received the guidance necessary to navigate their career paths successfully.

Sahan Kodituwakku – President of the Computer Society of UOP – eagerly anticipating further collaborations of this nature, went on to express his gratitude to Virtusa’s Campus Reach Team and facilitators for providing the undergrads with a valuable opportunity to explore the latest technologies and their applications in real-life projects.

The participants too, expressed their gratitude for the experience and exposure received during the program. “What stood out the most was the quality of guidance provided during the sessions. The instructors were knowledgeable and approachable, making it easy to grasp complex concepts,” Darshana Thamara stated, while Viranga Jayawardana emphasized on the training benchmark maintained by Virtusa, saying “The comprehensive content and well-structured sessions were incredibly informative and valuable, and the session materials were well-prepared and easy to follow, making it an enriching learning experience. I greatly appreciate the effort put into organizing this workshop and the depth of knowledge shared throughout the event.”

[1] https://www.forbes.com/sites/bernardmarr/2023/10/09/the-10-biggest-cloud-computing-trends-in-2024-everyone-must-be-ready-for-now/?sh=f9206b966d67#:~:text=Worldwide%2C%20spending%20by%20businesses%20on,artificial%20intelligence%20(AI)%20services.

December 6, 2023

Colombo, December 2023 – A transformative event has reshaped the banking landscape with 60+ C-level Bankers in 20+ top banks and Financial Institutions in Sri Lanka, organized by IFINITY Global, the tech enablers rewriting the rules for banks, embracing the Intelligent, Infinite, Invisible banking revolution. With the Strategic partners Temenos and Bahwan CyberTek, supported by technology partners Dialog Enterprise and Sys Enact orchestrated the symposium at the Shangri-La Colombo on November 28, 2023.

The forum served as a platform to showcase the transformative potential of cloud banking and underscored the pivotal role played by Temenos, the global No – 1 banking software company. The event included international speakers such as Managing Director APAC, Temenos – Ramki Ramakrishnan, Principal BSG Consultant, Temenos – Zannettos Zannettou, and Chief Technology Officer for BFSI Sector, Microsoft India – Vijosh Ammayath, who conducted sessions on the evolving technology and market landscape shaping the future of banking in Sri Lanka.

The keynote address by Temenos’ Ramki Ramakrishnan provided insights on the banking technology trends, with advice for banks in the Asia Pacific region on how to “engage and grow in a cloud world”. According to Ramakrishnan, the case for the public cloud in banking is growing, citing a new Economist Impact study for Temenos of global banking executives, in which, more than half (51%) of respondents agreed that banks will no longer own any data centers due to the move to public cloud in next five years. Banks are increasingly moving to the cloud due to business agility, efficiency, security, and environmental considerations. Sri Lanka aims to catch up with other ASEAN countries like Singapore and Malaysia in adopting cloud technology for essential banking services.

Zannettos Zannettou took the stage with “Trust in SaaS: Differentiating on Data, Security, Regulations, and Certification,” which emphasized the untapped potential of data within banks and its role as a competitive advantage for modern Sri Lankan banks. The discussion revolved around data management best practices for banking in the cloud, reinforcing the importance of data security and regulatory compliance. According to Zannettou, establishing trust in cloud technology is crucial, with 700 SaaS customers, in 5 continents, covering over 30 regulatory jurisdictions, Temenos has a trusted platform that brings true banking capabilities at scale to incumbents and new players.

The session titled ‘Impactful Deployment of Cloud Native Solutions’, delivered by AVP/ Head of Customer Experience – Devinda De Zoya, and Vice President of Delivery, – Ravindra Basnayaka, spotlighted IFINITY’s substantial contribution to core banking and cloud banking in collaboration with Temenos and Azure. The session also provided insight into IFINITY’s best practices, implementation experiences, reference architectures of Temenos on Azure and managed services, covering capabilities in the cloud world, including Platform as a Service (PaaS), multi-cloud, hybrid cloud solutions, and business consulting functions.

The Dialog Enterprise session, conducted by Product Head – Cloud and IDC, Dialog Enterprise – Saranga Namala, and Head – Enterprise Business Solutions, Dialog Enterprise – Madhava Siriwardhane, explored the significance of regulatory compliance in the cloud, emphasizing the secure and flexible nature of cloud technology for banks and its compliance with regulatory standards.

The collaborative efforts between Azure and IFINITY were highlighted in the ” Next Generation Banking with Azure” session by CTO – BFSI, Microsoft India – Vijosh Ammayath. The discussion delved into the introduction of cloud computing for core banking, the latest offerings from Azure in the financial services sector, and how Azure supports IFINITY and Temenos.

The concluded event group chairman, NCINGA and IFINITY – Imal Kaluthotage, stated “It is our distinct vision to guide Sri Lankan banks through a transformative journey that transcends the realms of traditional cloud services, positioning them as the AI-driven banks of the future. Our commitment is underscored by the strategic cultivation of homegrown talent, forged through collaborative partnerships with industry leaders such as Temenos and Azure. By leveraging the expertise of these esteemed allies, IFINITY is dedicated to fostering innovation and empowering the financial landscape with cutting-edge AI capabilities.

December 1, 2023

IronOne Technologies’ flagship stock trading platform, ATrad, marked a historic milestone with the launch of Sri Lanka’s first international cloud-hosted stock trading and brokering platform. The event, titled “Beyond Horizons,” took place on November 23rd at Cinnamon Grand, Colombo, gathering an esteemed audience comprising Stockbroker CEOs, Colombo Stock Exchange, and Securities and Exchange Commission officials, prominent Investment Advisors, as well as key partners and vendors.

The evening commenced with an inspiring opening speech by Lakmini Wijesundera, Founder and Executive Director of IronOne Technologies and BoardPAC. ATrad, along with IronOne AI Labs, and BoardPAC collectively represent a formidable force in the global tech industry, serving a user base exceeding 5 million across 40+ countries, including prestigious Forbes Global 2000 and Fortune 500 companies.

Ms. Lakmini Wijesundera articulated the company’s vision, stating, “Our commitment to uplifting Sri Lanka’s capital market through cutting-edge technology has driven two decades of innovation. Today, I take immense pride in unveiling a new chapter for ATrad – Sri Lanka’s inaugural cloud-based stock trading and brokering platform. This achievement is just the beginning of a series of groundbreaking advancements.”

The Chief Architect, Lushanthan Sivaneasharajah, and the Senior Manager of Client Relations and Business Development, Mr. Shenoy De Silva, took center stage to illuminate ATrad’s cloud migration journey, elucidating the myriad benefits and the platform’s future trajectory. Utilizing the higher performance and reliability of AWS cloud enables ATrad to dynamically scale up to cater to the market demands. Furthermore, ATrad’s direct integration with Bloomberg EMSX facilitates foreign customers to route their orders directly through Bloomberg to ATrad, allowing the assigned advisors to manage these orders with total control to trade on CSE.

Mr. Praveen De Silva, Director of Global Business Solutions and Client Success, expressed his enthusiasm, stating, “Today’s revelation of ATrad’s cloud migration marks a significant leap toward aligning Sri Lanka’s stock market with global standards. The dedicated efforts of our team over the past year have culminated in this transformative milestone. As we venture into this new era, we are confident that ATrad’s enhanced capabilities will not only redefine our local landscape but also position us as a beacon of innovation in the international financial arena.”

IronOne tantalized the audience with upcoming developments, unveiling the ATrad API Suite, featuring Seamless Bank Integration, an Investor Portal for onboarding and KYC management, and the introduction of the ATrad wealth management and ATrad primary dealer platforms. These additions epitomize IronOne and ATrad’s commitment to pushing the boundaries of finance and technology.

The event culminated on a high note, with officials from the Colombo Stock Exchange and our esteemed partners expressing excitement about the future of the stock market with ATrad. The “Beyond Horizons” launch event indeed set the stage for a new era in Sri Lanka’s stock trading landscape. IronOne Technologies and ATrad remain committed and strong partners of the capital markets ecosystem in Sri Lanka and look forward to continuing to uplift this industry where technological contribution is assured.

September 14, 2023

Offering a globally recognized feature-rich contact centre solution with a wide range of benefits, SLT-MOBITEL Enterprise’s Premium Contact Centre solution powered and managed by the Avaya Inaipi Cloud boosts productivity and delivers personalised interactions tailored to meet the evolving needs of enterprise customers.

The solution is built to meet the unique needs of enterprise contact centres needs while enjoying the flexibility and simplicity of a cloud-based platform. Key features include an Omni Channel Contact Centre that seamlessly engages customers across multiple channels, including voice, chat, email, and social media. The solution enables enhanced call routing and optimizes customer interactions through Interactive Voice Response (IVR) and Automatic Call Distribution (ACD). It also provides enterprise CRM integration with existing CRM systems to access real-time customer data and provide a 360-degree view of each interaction.

Through an outbound dialler, enterprises can efficiently manage outbound customer communications for proactive support and campaign activities. Designed with advanced reporting and analytic tools, it offers valuable insights into contact centre performance. Equipped with a web-based agent desktop, the solution empowers agents with a user-friendly and intuitive interface for improved efficiency.

Additionally, the solution offers many value-added service (VAS) modules to choose from, including a range of VAS modules to enhance contact centre functionalities and tailored them to meet the specific business needs of enterprises.

The premium contact centre also offers a remote working facility, enabling agents to work from remote locations, ensuring business continuity and flexibility. The managed services, or 24×7 support, ensures enterprises enjoy round-the-clock support for uninterrupted operations and peace of mind.

Importantly, customers can select from two comprehensive solution bundles, CC Voice and CC Omni, each equipped with a range of value-added services. The CC Voice caters to all the requirements of a voice-only contact centre. While the CC Omni builds on top of the voice platform to offer multiple channels. However, customers can also have a mix of both packages in the same contact centre, ensuring features such as a customer journey visualization and drill-down facility for agents to access past interactions, conduct automated post-interaction surveys, enable customer 360 view with screen popups, and allow customers to request call-backs without waiting in queue.

SLT-MOBITEL Enterprise remains committed to #DoBusinessBetter by providing cutting-edge solutions that enable businesses to thrive in the digital era. With SLT-MOBITEL Enterprise’s Premium Contact Centre solution powered by the Avaya Inaipi cloud, enterprises can prioritize #BusinessIntelligence, elevate their customer interactions, deliver personalized experiences, and stay ahead in today’s competitive business landscape.

For more information, please contact 0112 381 381 or email queries@enterprise.slt.lk

June 27, 2023

In today’s rapidly evolving digital landscape, retailers and organisations are continually having to embrace and implement innovative payment changes to streamline payment processes and improve the overall customer experience. An important consideration in this regard for retailers who own their own payment switch is moving it to the cloud, a complex but necessary upgrade and safeguard that requires industry expertise and experience to deliver the programme without introducing extra operational risks.

As a leading global PayTech solution provider, Stanchion has more than 20 years’ experience solving complex payment problems for clients around the world. Currently, Stanchion is engaging with the largest payment switch vendor on a strategic European project, which entails migrating a large on-premise infrastructure to cloud. The project’s scope involves moving an existing multi-tenant payment switch to a well-known Cloud provider with Stanchion providing a solution architect to design the solution and provide support during the implementation and go-live phases to the project team.

It is this hands-on experience that makes Stanchion a smart choice for retailers and organisations looking to migrate their payment switch to cloud, with their team of experts having clear insights into both the short- and long-term benefits and challenges.

Key drivers

The main drivers for moving to the cloud include cost-saving, flexibility and compliance, with scalability set to come into play in the future.

Migrating a payment switch to the cloud can help reduce infrastructure expenditure as the cost of leasing on-premise data centres is high. By moving to the cloud, costs can drop significantly as hardware, software licences and maintenance costs fall to the cloud vendor.

Furthermore, maintaining PCI compliance of a self-hosted data centre is always a painful and risky process – it requires lots of working hours and brings risk to the organisation in case of a PCI audit failure. Moving to the cloud reduces compliance operations for the organisation as, once again, a subset of the responsibility shifts to the cloud vendor.

In terms of flexibility, this is enhanced by built-in cloud services such as network firewalls and HSM services.

While scalability is not one of the current key drivers regarding mainly the payment switches, it is likely to become so in the future. By implementing their payment switch migration now, retailers can stay ahead of the curve and be ready to take immediate advantage of the scalability benefits when they come. As Stanchion’s Senior Solutions Consultant, Costas Valakas, points out that most payment platforms are not cloud optimised, meaning they often do not utilise microservice benefits. “Having said that, however, we are going to see the real benefits in scalability as soon as the switch vendors start redesigning their products based on the microservice architecture. These benefits will be huge as retailers and organisations will be able to spin off multiple miniature switches on-demand,” says Valakas.

He lists the example of retailers being able to scale up to meet the transaction surge over the festive season (or even worse on Black Friday) and then scale back down afterwards when transactions ease off. “Similarly, if there is a service disruption in one region, new switch instances can be created in real time in another region and provide the necessary bandwidth for the online processing.” And because it is cloud based, this could all be done almost automatically with minimal manual intervention.

Valakas highlights that taking advantage of the DevOps-friendly cloud infrastructure means a lot of operations can now be performed automatically, including one-off operations like the deployment of payment servers and repetitive ones, such as software maintenance, patches installation, parameters configuration, back-office operations and more.

Time challenges

Despite these benefits, moving their payment infrastructure to the cloud is a big step for retailers and many are reluctant to embrace this change. As well as needing a culture shift within the organisation and buy-in from the top down, migrating a payment switch to the cloud requires careful assessment and planning, as well as preparation and testing to ensure a smooth transition.

The time frame is lengthy: in Stanchion’s experience, organisations need at least two years from initial decision to going live, depending on the infrastructure’s complexity.

· The first phase involves the setting up of the cloud infrastructure, including DevOps workflow preparations and can take up to 9 months to complete.

· Phase two, typically, requires an additional year and involves migrating the actual payment platform to the respective cloud servers and covers software installation, parameterisation and extensive testing.

· The final go-live phase is done gradually, with a full-store migration taking up to two months, depending on the retailer’s size.

Optimised solutions

Stanchion’s Verto and Switchcare solutions can be utilised to underpin and ensure a smooth migration to the cloud.

“During the preparation phase, before moving to the cloud, Verto can abstract a lot of the switch’s functionality and integrate it with the Verto framework,” explains Valakas. And because Verto is cloud-optimised, it makes the migration smoother and easier. “Additionally, Verto can be easily scaled horizontally, providing redundancy to any service it performs. The organisation can also benefit from other out-of-the-box services Verto provides such as notifications, integration with alternative payment channels, card token life-cycle management and more.”

SwitchCare’s combination of on-prem and cloud-based deployment support means it can give retailers the assurance they require to deliver the high service levels customers demand. SwitchCare’s full stack combination of platform, application and real-time transaction monitoring can support the transition, minimising the risk of outages and providing assurances during this critical time.

With extensive migration project experience over the last two years, combined with the experience the team acquired on cloud architecture during the development of its Verto and SwitchCare solutions, Stanchion is ideally positioned to guide and assist organisations as they migrate their payment switches to the cloud by designing the solution and providing implementation support.

As Valakas says: “Our hands-on experience, combined with our team’s deep payment switch knowledge and long exposure to payment-related projects, means Stanchion can provide a full range of services to retailers and organisations looking to take this crucial – and essential – next leap forward on their payments journey.”

March 8, 2023

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Huawei held Product & Solution Launch 2023 at Mobile World Congress (MWC23), and Huawei Cloud is there to release its new global offerings such as Landing Zone and Cloud on Cloud.

Jacqueline Shi, President of Huawei Cloud Global Marketing and Sales Service, delivered a keynote speech entitled “Unleash Digital with Everything as a Service”. “We hope to provide reliable, secure, and sustainable services for our customers, partners, and developers, with everything done on the cloud.” said Ms. Shi.

Innovate for Greater Market Presence

KooVerse, the global Huawei Cloud infrastructure, delivers a premium cloud experience with just 50 ms latency. Demanding services such as real-time audio and video, gaming, and online education are now agile and efficient. So far, KooVerse has 78 availability zones (AZs) in 29 Regions, and serves customers in more than 170 countries and regions.

Landing Zone is a sustainable, scalable multitenancy solution to automate B2B services for carriers. The solution offers layered cloud resource management, identity and permissions design, data boundaries, compliance audit, and financial management. It helps enterprises build a lean IT governance system that coordinates people, finance, and things.

Cloud Container Instance (CCI) is a serverless container service that allows users to run containerized applications without creating or managing cloud servers or underlying resources. With CCI, even a ten-fold increase in traffic is no longer an impact to services or systems.

The Pangu series of AI models cover drug development and computer vision (CV) applications. Pangu models are pre-trained using hundreds of billions of parameters, and proven effective in more than 100 use cases in more than 10 industries, such as healthcare, electricity, and mining.

Inspire New Growth with Carriers

To help carriers expand into the enterprise market, Huawei Cloud releases the Cloud on Cloud solution. Carriers now make the most of the services, technologies, ecosystems, and sales resources of Huawei Cloud, together with their own industry-leading networks, to fuel digital transformation. Access to one-stop cloud service operations through resale, dual branding, and sole branding is customizable to their own needs.

2022 has been a year of progress for Huawei Cloud. In terms of industry recognition, Huawei Cloud was named in Garter Magic Quadrant for Cloud Infrastructure and Platform Services (CIPS) in October 2022. In terms of global infrastructure, Huawei Cloud launched new Regions in Indonesia and Ireland, with new ones in Türkiye, Saudi Arabia, and other places to come this year.

March 2, 2023

Colombo, March 01, 2023 – IFS, the global cloud enterprise software company, announced today that it is celebrating the 25^th anniversary of the inception of its Sri Lankan operations. Since its humble beginning in 1997, with just 26 employees in a two roomed office in Colombo 03, IFS has made major investments into the workforce and community, becoming the second largest technology employer in the country.

At a time when Sri Lanka’s ICT industry was developing, IFS saw an opportunity to set up its innovation hub in the Asian region due to the country’s excellent technology talent. Sri Lanka is now an integral part of IFS’s international success, with close to 80% of global product support services and 60% of the global product development of IFS being facilitated out of Colombo.

Today, IFS Sri Lanka is a powerhouse in the local ICT industry, with more than 2,200 employees, accounting for approximately 40% of IFS’s global staff. Over the last 25 years, the company has generated more than 5,000 employment opportunities for Sri Lankans, helping to shape the future of many industry professionals.

IFS Chief Executive Officer Darren Roos commented: “It goes without saying that our Sri Lankan team has played a critical role in providing us with the organizational support and agility we needed to achieve the growth that we have.” Roos continued “The team’s contribution to our success and company culture is felt throughout the organisation because it supports so many of IFS’s working processes from R&D to HR, Marketing, Support and more. I am very proud of what we have achieved together and of the contribution that we are making as the second largest employer and with the IFS Foundation. Roos concluded “25 years is a very significant journey that we look forward to progressing as we also continue to invest in our business here.”

Over the past five years, our employee base in Sri Lanka has almost tripled since 2017 to over 2,200.”

IFS Sri Lanka its IFS ‘s most extensive R&D center outside of Sweden and supports functions across Finance, Procurement, Marketing, Global Customer Support, Cloud Operations, Consulting, and IFS Labs. The IFS Labs operation drives innovation, value into IFS products and solutions across all industries for IFS customers worldwide.

IFS Sri Lanka also manages the South Asia Customer Organization, which offers services and supports for IFS Cloud.

IFS Executive Vice President & Chief Operating Officer Ranil Rajapakse, who is also one of the original IFS Sri Lanka employees, commented: “It is a surreal moment to reflect upon our humble start with 26 people in our Colombo office and compare it to where we are now. 25 years ago, IFS was virtually unknown in Sri Lanka, but today people recognize it as a well-respected technology big-hitter and a force to be reckoned with in the industry.”

“It has been a rich and rewarding experience to witness the company’s ascent and transformation over the last 25 years. Especially seeing the extensive growth of our employee network entering IFS as graduates, I am honored to work alongside such an intelligent, hardworking, and driven team of professionals. I cannot wait to see what the next 25 years bring for IFS Sri Lanka,” concluded Rajapakse.

Recently, IFS Sri Lanka was ranked amongst the top 100 Sri Lankan corporates by LMD (Lanka Monthly Digest) Magazine in its 18th ‘Most Respected Entities in Sri Lanka’ edition. In addition to being honored as one of the most respected entities, IFS has also been ranked as a top Sri Lankan business entity in Dynamism, Corporate Culture, Innovation, Management Profile, and HR/People Management lists.

IFS has also taken bold steps to improve living standards and break the poverty cycle in Sri Lanka through the IFS Foundation. The company has invested in a series of projects in partnership with local communities in remote and rural areas of the country to renovate schools and hospitals, improve access to fresh water, and create employment opportunities.

January 19, 2023

Colombo, 19th January 2023 – MiHCM, a global HR technology provider, successfully implemented MiHCM Cloud across the global manufacturing facilities of the Hela Group in Sri Lanka, Ethiopia, and Egypt. The programme was initiated with an aim to digitize its HR operations and increase employee efficiency, productivity, overall engagement, and further improve access to workforce insights. Hela is currently rolling out the MiHCM Cloud at their manufacturing facility in Kenya, with the digital solution set to go live in June 2023.

“It was indeed a remarkable accomplishment for both the MiHCM and Hela teams to be able to transform their legacy HR systems to MiHCM Cloud across their global landscape. The clear vision set by the Group CIPO and CPO to build a strong digital core integrating enterprise systems is commendable. We look forward to continuously adding value to the implemented platform with our analytics and employee engagement apps to ensure that Hela as an organization can accomplish its set objectives of operating efficiently while maintaining greater engagement with its workforce,” said Harsha Purasinghe, CEO of MiHCM.

MiHCM runs on the Microsoft Azure Cloud platform and will be tightly integrated with Hela’s recently rolled-out SAP S/4HANA® platform. Hela will be steered by MiHCM in managing the employee lifecycle, from recruitment to retirement, covering both operational and strategic HR

“Hela is on a journey towards digitalisation, which we believe will be crucial in preparing us to face the challenging times ahead successfully. The partnership with MiHCM is another step forward in terms of digitalising our HR processes for heightened efficiency and productivity. With this implementation, Hela employees will use a face recognition feature to check-in and check- out of work through a digital kiosk, which is also accessible via the mobile app. Employees across the world are looking at easier ways to complete the required processes at work, and initiatives such as this allow for routine HR tasks to be completed without a hassle, changing the way the HR function operates”. Said Ruwanthi Fernando, Chief Information and Process Officer of Hela Apparel Holdings.

MiHCM Cloud is designed to transform a company’s HR operations through the utilisation of fully-fledged workforce and talent management capabilities and real-time data analytics that aid companies in reaching the potential of their workforce. This solution empowers employees to perform routine HR chores such as submitting work activities, applying for leave, and other menial tasks.

“With over 20,000 employees across the globe, it is extremely important for us to be able to have all employee-related functions under one platform. The implementation of the MiHCM system across Hela will enhance our ability to be connected with our employees and access critical HR data easily, allowing us to build a progressive HR division that is ready to meet the challenges of tomorrow. A digitalised HR function is also more sustainable, improving our ability to reduce waste while improving productivity and efficiency. The talent management module will further help Hela to understand employee performance, facilitate Training and Development programs, and even help Hela hire the right talent for the right roles” said Kaushala Prematilake, Chief People Officer of Hela Apparel Holdings.

Hela Apparel Holdings PLC provides sustainability-focused apparel supply chain solutions. The company works closely with global brands, from design to delivery in the intimate, activewear and kids-wear product categories. With 10 manufacturing facilities across four countries and a workforce of 20,000 across the globe, Hela leads the industry in ethical and sustainable working environments.

Since MiHCM’s cloud journey in 2017, the company has developed specialised solutions for varying organisation sizes and industry verticals, including MiHCM Enterprise for medium and large businesses that cater to complex business requirements, MiHCM Lite for small businesses, MiHCM Analytics for delivering actionable insights on its workforce, and MiA Assistant for Microsoft Teams for a unique employee experience that streamlines and assists employees in completing routine work/HR tasks while driving employee engagement, all within Microsoft Teams.

Today, MiHCM serves an international clientele of over 200,000 users in 500+ companies across 16 countries. As an ISO 9001 and 27001 certified company, MiHCM takes rigorous measures to meet customer expectations and ensure quality, security, and privacy.

To learn more about MiHCM, visit www.mihcm.com

December 13, 2022

December 13, 2022: Enterprise Analytics and IFS successfully hosted their first customer summit, which brought together many business leaders from across various industries. The event, which was designed to highlight the business benefits of IFS Cloud, was held at the Hilton Colombo.

Speakers from both organizations and current customers, the Silvermill Group, shared insights on the product roadmap, key features, implementation strategies, the value of choosing the right implementation partner, and the business value generated by utilizing IFS Cloud.

Speaking about the event, Eranda Maldeniya, Director of Enterprise Analytics, said, “I’m happy with the participation we received. It simply shows that keeping up to date with the latest technology is critical for a business to maintain a competitive edge regardless of which industry you are in. This is why we conceived Evergreen. It was a way for us to help inform some of our nation’s most prominent companies about the best-in-class technology available to them that can help unlock their true potential.”

“We believe IFS Cloud can play a significant role in making them more competitive locally as well as on the world stage, thereby securing their future growth and stimulating the long-term economic growth of Sri Lanka. When they do better, we all do better,” he added.

IFS Cloud’s state-of-the-art Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) capabilities are designed according to industry best practices with a concrete framework that leverages a mobile-first environment. The platform gives an organization complete control over its data and the ability to access it anywhere in the world using any device. Ultimately, the solution helps management achieve a seamless workplace experience for their employees and reduces business complexity, cost and risk.

“We were thrilled to partner with Enterprise Analytics on Evergreen,” said Uthpala Kumara, Head of Sales and Partnerships, IFS South Asia. “Events like this help share vital knowledge that can accelerate a company’s digital transformation and improve its competitiveness in the marketplace. IFS Cloud was designed to offer companies an uncomplicated path towards becoming more data-driven and help improve innovation. It is a scalable solution that can be used across all business functions and connect global operations. We believe it will facilitate companies in delivering exceptional moments of service.”

IFS develops and delivers enterprise software for companies worldwide which manufacture and distribute goods, build and maintain assets, and manage service-focused operations. Within a single platform, its industry-specific products are innately connected to a single data model and use embedded digital innovation so businesses can be their best when it matters to their customers—at the Moment of Service™.

Enterprise Analytics is an ERP and software development company that delivers strategic change to businesses globally. The company’s team of IFS-certified consultants have the deep domain knowledge and extensive experience needed to accommodate the unique needs of organizations across a myriad of industries. With offices in Asia, the Middle East, Australia, the UK and America, EA’s specialist teams are able to deliver exceptional service across geographies. This broad reach has also allowed the company to offer 24×7 global support, thus guaranteeing their promise of Transformation Driven by People.

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