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Gandhi's
"yellowpages" goes online in seven countries Gandhi, who also is the owner of the domain name 'www.srilankayellowpages.com', was in Colombo recently to meet Corporate Directories (Pvt) Ltd, the licensed local operators of the domain. Gandhi, who started his business with 'indiayellowpages.com', told The Sunday Times Business he was introduced to the idea of a yellow pages website for the whole world by his business partner in Mauritius. Mauritius became the first website outside India after he had realised the potential existing in the country during one of his visits. Gandhi says the phrase 'yellow pages' is a "top of the mind" word combination that a layman - in any part of the world - would use to find contact details of product or service providers. Hence the objective behind owning the yellow page domain increases the chances of a first page hit in the search results. The concept has been activated in seven countries and will total 14 within the next few months as Cybernet signs up more local service providers in several countries. According to Gandhi, this number would have been much higher if not for the recent 'dot com' crash that retarded his expansion. Having had the foresight of maximising the use of the Internet, Gandhi has also kept pace with technology and built his web pages to be database driven from the original HTML version in 1996. Cybernet now acts as the main service provider and provides support to its partners for hosting and design of the portal for each country. Each of the active country portals has a built-in advanced search engine that fetches search results from the immediate website, other member yellow page websites and other external search engines such as Yahoo, etc. The entire business was valued at $175 million in 2000 by a US company that was ready to float an IPO, before it was dropped due to external constraints, according to Gandhi. Currently Cybernet operates on a revenue sharing model with its country partners while providing the technology and hosting free of charge. Locally, Corporate Directories (Pvt) Ltd, publishers of the Island Business Directory, also operate www.srilankayellowpages.com and provides all its advertisers a value added listing on the website. Enhanced advertisements such as corporate profiles, banners and home pages are also offered on additional payment. The Island Business Directory has been published for the last eight years and averages over 2,500 advertisements per year, says Hashim Dole, the company's managing director. Its distribution follows a unique model where organisations and individuals are delivered free copies upon request both in Sri Lanka and around the world. Corporate Directories has also published the Suntel directory, CDL's Professional List and the Sri Lanka Lawyers' directory. Excitement
at the Taj The Taj Exotica is the group's second property in the Maldives with the new one being a top-end, star deluxe hotel built at a cost of $ 13 million and comprising 64 out-of-this-world lagoon villas. "It is the ultimate in luxury and comes with totally a-la-carte service - not buffet -, a personal spa and at $ 400 to $ 600 per night," said Lakhmana, who had visited the Maldives resort ahead of its opening, before coming to Colombo. Spending the last few days of her Sri Lankan visit last week at the Taj Airport Gardens in Katunayake, Lakhmana met operations and management personnel at the Taj's three properties including Taj Colombo and Taj Exotica in Bentota and undertook an operational review of the business. "We do this quite often," the Taj executive said, after a visit to two porcelain factories at Dankotuwa - a working trip aimed at looking at some designs for hotel cutlery. Lakhmana has worked for 10 years in the Taj group handling everything from sales to marketing before coming to her current assignment which she finds extremely interesting. "The job takes me to many hotel properties in the world," she said adding that last year's excitement was the launch of the Taj Palace in Dubai. The group has two properties in Dubai but had earlier exited from one, before launching the latest project which is managed by Taj but customarily owned by a local group. The Taj hotel group is bigger than the Oberoi hotel group and has 60 properties in the world including Sri Lanka (3), South Africa, St. James in London, Kathmandu, Dubai and the Maldives. The Taj Palace in Dubai has 240 rooms and 90 apartments, Lakhmana said adding, that what was unique in the hotel is that the staff represents 40 nationalities. "We deliberately wanted multinational staff because our guests also come from many countries and nationalities," she said. "It is nice to see different faces." The group is looking at expanding its hotel chain - in some cases at the rate of a hotel every two years in the near term with properties being eyed in Bali, Phuket in Thailand, Mauritius, Egypt and Sharjah. Lakhmana said these would all be super luxury, top-end hotels because that's "where our concentration is going to be". Next year could see another hotel opening in the Taj group, she added. (FS) Finding
customers and your business idea The book contains the best of sixty years of his writings on management. "Markets are not created by God, nature or economic forces but by business people" he argues and states that the want for a particular thing remains a potential want until someone comes along to convert it into an effective demand. In seeking business ideas among your potential customers, the distinction between selling and marketing becomes important. You sell a product or service that you have. A classic example in the selling mentality is Henry Ford who said, "I will give you any colour (of car) as long as it is black." Businesses can no longer afford to be this arrogant. In contrast, marketing seeks to satisfy a need or want rather than try to palm off a product or service on the customer. A marketer tries to deliver value. Customers don't pay for goods and services. They pay for the utility or value they can enjoy. Customers do not buy tables; they buy surfaces for work or for the family to gather around at dinner. How can this concept help in choosing a business idea? You can choose a particular sector or field of choice and try to find out what a selected group of customers need. What needs remain unfulfilled? Can you give them value which they will readily pay for? If you can find such a need, there you have a potential business idea; a potential market. It is easy to find a market if you are innovative in your thinking. In Drucker's book I found a great example. Do you think you can sell a refrigerator to an Eskimo? No? Think again. Temperatures in Alaska can drop below minus 30 degrees Celsius and worse. We look at refrigerators to keep our food cold. But, you can show the Eskimo that it will help him to keep his food from growing too cold; it will prevent his drinks from freezing. Neither the product nor the conditions have changed. But, you have created value for the Eskimo by helping him see differently. Their gateaux, puddings and fruit will never freeze again. You have definitely created utility and hence economic value. Creating value is not enough. Is there sufficient demand to make your product or service profitable? This depends upon the product or service as well as the profit margin. A high profit per transaction will require sale of relatively few items or service deliveries. For that same profit, you will need to sell large volumes of a low profit margin product. To match in rupee terms the profit in building and selling one luxury home, you will have to make and sell millions of plastic bags or toffees. Next week, we will talk about ascertaining the market size for a product or service. If you have more than one business idea to choose from, market size and profitability helps you narrow down the number of choices. We invite your ideas on what areas you want us to cover in future articles. Please send your questions and comments to btimes@wijeya.lk or call 074-304100. The writer is a Chartered Management Accountant by profession with a Masters in Business Administration from the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow. She is the Managing Editor of Athwela Vyaparika Sangarawa (Athwela Business Journal), a Sinhala management monthly. ComBank-Sri
Lanka's best The New York based monthly, circulated in over 160 countries, has selected the Commercial Bank on the basis of its financial performance in 2001, prudent use of resources and heavy investment in technology and solid capital base and capital adequacy ratios, a bank statement said. This year's Global Finance survey of the best domestic banks in emerging markets includes famous establishments from Asia like HSBC, ICICI Bank of India, Public Bank of Malaysia, Kookmin Bank of South Korea alongside the Commercial Bank of Ceylon. Asia Securities
Ltd records impressive turnover It is ranked number one based on turnover as well as on brokerage for the calendar year 2001. The company is also ranked number one based on turnover and brokerage for the financial year ending 31 March 2002. The company said it has maintained its number one or two position based on the cumulative brokerage in the last 10 years. Asia Securities was the first and is still the only stockbroker to introduce and offer Internet based online market data. This online facility enables the company's clients to access live market data from the Colombo Stock Exchange by logging on to www.eTradeCSE.com. The website also enables Asia Securities clients to place orders to buy or sell stocks via the Internet from anywhere in the world. Asia Securities Ltd promoted Asia Capital Ltd in 1994 and now is positioned as a diversified holding company engaged in an array of business activities ranging from financial services, insurance, debt securities, apparel manufacturing to information technology. The board of directors of Asia Securities Ltd are chairman - Nigel Austin, CEO - Tushan Wickramasinghe, executive directors - Dirk Flamer-Caldera, Priyani Ratna-Gopal and Dushyanth Wijesinghe and non-executive director - Asanga Seneviratne. Human
Resources Ball 2002 This social event will provide the preliminary platform for Human Resources professionals to meet and form closer ties. The dance will also provide a unique opportunity to provide Human Resources professionals in different fields to join up with representatives of the state, the pubic sector and the private sector, employer organisations and employee organisations at the highest level to interact in a relaxed environment. This will facilitate greater fellowship and integration among the Human Resources community in the nation, a SriLankan Airlines statement said. BOI uplifts
bra business The total investment for this project by Jessop and Baird Lanka (Pvt) Ltd is Rs. 506 million, the statement said adding this was among 13 agreements signed by the BOI in April worth Rs. 2. 5 billion. Another significant project is in the tourism sector with Male-based Cyprea (Pvt) Ltd investing Rs. 760 million in taking over the assets of the Sinbad Hotel and upgrading it to international standards. Vehicles Lanka (Pvt) Ltd, a Japan-Sri Lanka joint venture, is assembling motor vehicles for the local market using imported second-hand motor vehicle parts from Japan. This project will be located at Homagama with an investment of Rs. 500 million. Linea Sensual (Pvt) Ltd from the Mas Holdings group has signed yet another agreement to manufacture ladies underwear. These include briefs and lingerie for the UK market. SIA'S
first SpaceBed aircraft takes off An SIA statement said the new Raffles Class lie-flat seat, the SpaceBed, is designed to afford more space and comfort for business travellers. Besides a wider and longer sleeping surface, the SpaceBed's unique cushioning system conforms more effectively to the body's contours, allowing passengers to rest even more comfortably in their preferred sleeping positions. Each SpaceBed comes equipped with KrisWorld, SIA's new-generation inflight entertainment system based on Matsushita Avionic's latest MAS 3000 system. It offers unrivalled high quality digital sound and pictures on demand on a 10.4 inch high-resolution monitor. Installed at a cost of $100 million, SpaceBeds will be retrofitted over the next year on 45 B747 Megatops and B777-200ER (extended range) aircraft serving long and medium haul destinations. Bottling
onions and ambul thiyal Started in 1993, Super Foods exports bottled pickles, dried fish and other bottled spice products to Australia and New Zealand. A graduate who had been at home for over four years before she received a teaching appointment, Paranahewa had decided not to accept the job. "I received the letter of appointment the day after my eldest child was born. There was no way I could take up the appointment back then," said Paranahewa who later started the export business. She had started Super Foods by bottling pickles and other local dishes for export with two friends. "I had always wanted to do something different and be an independent person. So we displayed our products in a stall at an export trade fair with my friends. We had a good response and received many orders." Following their success at this fair, Paranahewa started the export business in 1993 after handling a number of trial orders. In 1993 she had attended a lady bosses' seminar organised by USAID. "They encouraged me to expand the business and promised financial support. They even helped with my labels." In 1994, however, she was forced to stop her business due to problems with her co-partners but later continued the business on her own with the assistance of the Export Development Board. She has attended a number of seminars and trade fairs held in India, Singapore, Bangladesh and Australia under EDB guidance and expanded her business gradually. In expanding, she had moved from small pots and pans to large basins and buckets and even purchased an onion-cutter. She displayed her products at another stall and attracted a number of new customers. "I never manufactured products for the Sri Lankan market because it is difficult to deal with local buyers. Besides, the competition is tough and I don't want to get into any hassle," she said. According to Stella Wijesinghe, who peels hundreds of onions per day, the work at Super Foods is done by everyone. There are no specific tasks assigned and all the bottles are filled after mixing the ingredients in a huge basin. "This is done to maintain the same flavour throughout ," she said, opening a huge blue basin full of fried karawala and coriander leaves. "The Sri Lankans living abroad like these products. You can keep a bottle open for two to three weeks without refrigeration," noted Paranahewa, who sells some of her products to regular local clients. She makes seeni sambol, polos achcharu, karawala, lunu dehi, chutney, ambul thiyal and paste, and batu moju for the export market. Most of the large-scale companies that engage in exporting these products buy Paranahewa's products. "I don't handle direct exports anymore because it is difficult. I supply finished products to companies and they export under their labels." Over the years Paranahewa has increased the number of employees engaged in her home-business and has five regular workers now. "I did everything on my own when my friends left. But now I have regular workers. My family supported me throughout and I am very happy that I have come this far." While five women work on a regular basis, Paranahewa employs more people when she gets a big order. Most of these workers comprise mothers who bring children to a nearby school. "They help me by peeling onions or washing other ingredients or even sterilising the bottles. They do a half day's work and leave when school finishes." However, sometimes she finds it difficult get the help she requires. "When we handle something like ambul thiyal these mothers don't like to work because the fish gives an unpleasant odour. We have stopped doing ambul thiyal now despite it being a lucrative line of business. Besides, I have no plans to do a lot of work because what matters is the satisfaction I derive out of this business. If I try to expand, it will take most of my time." Today her business has reached a point where the girls have the ability to carry on the work without much supervision. "I have to occasionally look into things but things are not tough anymore." In the business for nearly 10 years Paranahewa is pleased with the decision she had made years ago. "I wanted to be independent and be my own boss. With this business, I am both," she said with a smile of contentment. |
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