Business ICT

PC House, a decade in operation and going strong

PC House the pioneering company of PCH Holdings, the holding company of a chain of well diversified independent companies in Sri Lanka celebrated its 10th anniversary recently.

PC House was the launching pad for revolutionary companies such as Panora Corporation, PC Partner, PC Pharma, Panora Taiwan, AV Corporation, OA Corporation, PCH Distributors, Sansiyo Corporation, Sheetal Samudra Restaurant, and many others, which now come under the corporate banner of PCH Holdings.

PC House has spread to computer manufacturing, forward and backward industry integration, hospitality sector, pharmaceuticals and electronic equipment trading, reaching out to international markets within a short span of 10 years.

The parent company that’s vision is to “be the leader in high growth diversified business portfolio with a global presence” considers its mission to be passionately engaged in providing the customer with quality solutions through innovative technology and provide the employees with excellent growth opportunities.

PC House was founded by S.H.M. Rishan, who steered the company to its present success during a short period of 10 years. What started out as a simple PC vending shop in the then growing IT hub called Colombo, a decade ago grew with new business thinking led by Rishan and his team.

Discussing about the leadership position PC House has achieved during the last decade, its Chairman Rishan said, “When I first founded a PC shop 10 years ago I foresaw that IT was going to be the talk of the town during the next few years.

Making my prediction a reality, Sri Lanka’s IT industry started booming with the dawn of the new millennium and this brought us many related and unrelated growth opportunities.

With Information and Communication Technology (ICT) industry flourishing in Sri Lanka, we managed to introduce our own brand of computer called ‘Panora’, bring down computer peripherals and accessories that represent world renowned brands, import state of the art audio visual and office automation equipment as well as software solutions, that give our customers a high level of service along with a satisfying work experience.”

The most notable achievement of PCH Holdings during its 10-year history is going overseas with the setting up of Panora Taiwan.

They have set up liaison offices in USA, Bangladesh and India with the objective of reaching towards international markets, mainly the Asia-Pacific region, Russia, Australia and New Zealand, Far East and Middle East and capitalise on the ever increasing and diversifying demand for IT products and services.

The company has ventured into pharmaceutical industry with the setting up of PC Pharma (Pvt.) Ltd. and entered into hospitality industry with the opening of the Authentic Indian restaurant, Sheetal Samudra.

PCH holdings in its expansion has managed to get into profitable strategic partnerships and alliances with global patent holding ICT companies such as Samsung, Gigabyte, Microsoft, US Robotics, Genius, Optoma, Kyocera, CNet, Transcend, BitDefender & Fortinet.

They have managed to tie-up with local organisations such as Sri Lanka Telecom, People’s Bank and Universities of Colombo and Moratuwa in order to add value to the IT industry through special service packages and training programmes.

PC House, a subsidiary of PCH Holdings is the only IT chain that has over 40 branches islandwide, including the North and East provinces and this has helped the group to steadily maintain 20%+ growth rate in the market year-on-year basis during the past five years.

In their endeavour to become a well sought after business entity PCH Holdings has managed to secure ISO 9001 and 14001 certifications for several of their operations. In addition, they have won awards and recognitions from their global partners such as Microsoft and Samsung.

HP expands entry-level server portfolio

HP recently announced new economical servers, application solution “blueprints” and enhanced remote management software that can help midsize companies reduce operating costs while supporting their growth.

The company’s entry-level server portfolio now includes four new HP ProLiant server platforms that help midsize customers with limited space, budgets and IT staff.

The servers’ easy-to-use tools guide users through system configuration for fast installation so customers can focus on what matters most - growing their businesses.

HP also has developed new Midmarket Business Solutions that cut the time and effort needed for customers and channel partners to either create or upgrade critical business applications for entry-level ProLiant servers.

Additionally, HP is helping customers save time and increase staff productivity by enhancing its Lights-Out 100 Remote Management capability with upgrades to ensure affordable remote server control.

The new products and solutions are part of HP’s Adaptive Infrastructure portfolio, which helps customers of all sizes reap the benefits of an infrastructure tailored to their business requirements.

“HP is aggressively focused on creating technologies that reduce complexity for midsize customers at every step,” said Tony Parkinson, vice president and general manager, Industry Standard Servers, HP Asia Pacific and Japan.

“With these new products and solutions tailored to address their needs, midsize customers don’t have to be IT experts to keep their businesses up and running.”

The four new platforms in the HP ProLiant entry-level portfolio are dense, high-capacity servers that improve data availability while protecting against data loss with embedded Serial ATA (SATA) Redundant Array of Independent Disks (RAID). In addition, these servers feature a high-efficiency power supply option which helps lower electricity costs.

The new lineup includes:

* HP ProLiant DL180 G5 - The DL180 is a low-cost, two-processor (2P) 2U(1) server, offering the newest Intel(r) quad-core architecture, three PCI-E slots, optional redundant power supplies, up to 12 large form factor hot plug drives and 9 terabytes (TB) of storage.

* HP ProLiant DL185 G5 - This new 2P 2U is a low-cost server with high capacity making it ideal for mail and messaging, video capture, online gaming and high-performance computing. The DL185 features up to 14 large form factor hot plug drives, 10.5 TB of storage, dual network interface cards (NICs), three PCI-Express slots and optional redundant power supplies.

* HP ProLiant DL165 G5 - The DL165 is a 2P 1U server that offers an outstanding combination of price, performance and flexibility. In an industry first, the DL165 features four 3.5-inch hard disk drives for demanding application needs or capacity requirements.

* HP ProLiant DL160 G5 — Announced in November but now available, the DL160 G5 is designed to meet the needs of midsize customers with high-performance computing environments, as its dense 2P 1U form factor is optimised for Intel’s newest quad-core architecture.

The server features two PCI-Express x16 2.0 slots, support for faster front side bus speeds, high-efficiency options and double the amount of storage versus previous generations.

Also updated with the new features are the ProLiant ML110 G5, ML150 G5, ML310 G5 and DL320 G5p.

SLIIT gains kudos for CISCO Network Academy Programme

SLIIT received the Global Career Recognition Award for their use of the Cisco Networking education programme. The award was given to the instructors and the academy that enabled students and alumni to use the Cisco Networking Academy education for their jobs or career advancement, particularly in diverse and unusual industries.

The Global Recognition Programme held nominations from mid-June to mid-September 2007.

Nominees were judged based on their ability to provide students with the opportunity and exposure to diverse and unique industries, the unique ways they helped students build their careers and learn business skills in order to apply it to networking, the diversity and uniqueness of the students and alumni’s specific jobs and industries along with their demonstration of career building through the utilisation of education and their use of networking knowledge to improve the business criteria for instructors and academies.

Winners were selected by committees around the globe and announced on 1st November, 2007.

The Individual Contribution Award was also awarded to SLIIT’s Professional Development Programmes Manager, Uditha Gamage, for his work on the Women in IT Initiatives, which promoted networking among women, the advanced curriculum adoption in Sri Lanka including Network security and Wireless Network Programmes as well as the career guidance and support he provided to the students of SLIIT.

“The IT industry is one which is forever growing, not only in size but also in its areas of implementation. At SLIIT we are always looking to push that boundary by encouraging our students to be innovative in their thinking.

To be recognised by Cisco for this is certainly a moment of pleasure for both me and the Institute,” said Gamage.

The Cisco Network Academy has a fully comprehensive programme that gives students the Internet technology skills essential in a global economy. The Networking academy delivers hands-on labs, instructor training and support and preparation for industry standard certifications, web-based content, online assessment and student performance tracking.

Launched in October 1997 in 64 educational institutions in seven states, the Networking Academy has now spread to more than 160 countries with over 1.6 million students enrolled in more than 10,000 academies located in high schools, technical schools, colleges, universities and community based organisations.

Along with the Cisco Network Academy SLIIT also runs other programmes from its Professional Development Programmes division.

Everything from Microsoft IT Academy Programmes, that provides students of all ages the skills they need to achieve their goals, from passing a standardised assessment to pursuing an information technology career, to a Web Development Programme containing all the comprehensive training needed to become a professional in the area, to a Knowledge Worker Certificate Course (KWC) provided for the beginner who is starting on computers.

True mobile wireless solution from ASUS

Secured mobile computing with high speed Internet access anywhere:

EPSI Computers, authorised distributors in Sri Lanka for ASUS, a provider of high-performance notebook computers, announced the V2 notebook series from ASUS that answers the need for a true mobile wireless solution anywhere.

The notebook is ideal for business travellers on the go without adding extra pounds while keeping the sleek professional outlook.

With personalised security feature, docking station connectivity as well as the latest 3G module, users can enjoy a dynamic high-speed computing experience in style.

Group Product Manager, Sankha Jayaratne of EPSI Computers stated that the V2 is incorporated with High-Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA) wireless broadband capability, where users can enjoy a boost for download speeds by approximately 10 times faster via WCDMA networks without the need to connect the computer to a mobile phone.

Access emails, surf the internet, download attachments and access corporate networks through the convenience of a virtual private network.

Complementing its 3.5G capability, the V2S also features a full suite of wireless connectivity via Wi-Fi (802.11 a/b/g) and Bluetooth 2.0 with enhanced data rate that provides three times faster data transfers with digital devices compared to standard Bluetooth.

To provide solid security and give the business travellers peace of mind, the V2 features safeguards that combine high-level security with ease of use with the fingerprint authentication facility where strict access will be available only to the designated owner.

For the most accurate reading, the electronic imaging mechanism scans fingerprint pattern from the live layer of the skin, bypassing any common skin surface conditions.