Finlays Colombo PLC (Finlays) is gearing to expand its cold storage business into other areas in the country in a bid to capitalise on Sri Lanka ’s peace dividend, while also looking to expand its sanitized medical-waste business, according to Kumar Jayasuriya, Chairman/Managing Director of the company.
“We own South Asia’s largest temperature controlled warehouse.
 With the war ending, we see opportunities for starting smaller warehouses across the country – such as in the Eastern, Southern and the North Central Provinces. This will not only help our existing customers distribute their products more efficiently, but will also cater to the needs of the fisheries, agriculture and animal husbandry sectors, to preserve and add value to the commodities harvested/produced in these areas,” he told the Business Times in an interview. He said that the company is currently examining the commercial viability of this idea as it is difficult to justify its business case due to the limitations in data.
Mr. Jayasuriya said that Finlays has applied for a 5-acre state land in Muthurajawela near Wattala and is presently putting out a project proposal to expand its sanitized medical-waste business. “Now we operate a clinical waste management and disposal service for private hospitals and laboratories where we offer an end-to-end waste management solution while treating medical waste using state of the art technology which disinfects and sterilizes waste prior to recycling,” he said. “We have begun to service the state sector hospitals too, but there is a splendid opportunity to increase the scale of this operation, hence the planned investment.”
He said Finlays’ focus in tea business will not change, but the company will innovate wherever it’s possible within its tea business. “We have been in tea for 117 years and Finlays’ parent company is the largest independent tea trader in the world. We will adapt our products according to the evolving consumption habits,” he explained.
Finlays is also re-examining how they can take their high-rise construction project forward with John Keells Holding (JKH) in Colombo 2. “We want to start it based on the same design concept where Finlays, JKH and Associated Motorways (AMW) wanted to build about three years ago. Now that AMW has pulled out of the project we are examining ways to unlock the potential of the underutilized land we have,” he added.
He said that best performing businesses, in terms of growth of profits over previous year and against budget, were Tea Exports, Insurance Brokering and Temperature-Controlled Logistics.
He said that in insurance broking, the company expanded its business portfolio by 93% by winning the accounts of several large Sri Lankan corporates and Maldivian resorts.
“While official figures have not yet been released, I believe we are now the leading property insurance broker,” he said. |
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