Advertorial
Dialog offers value-additions to inbound roamers
Dialog Mobile, is introducing a number of value-additions to inbound
roamers. Dialog has enhanced the connectivity facilities for its
international clientele with the introduction of a special personalized
welcome SMS, a mobile-based travel guide and free Wi-Fi connectivity.
The special welcome SMS will appear on the user’s mobile screen upon
arrival in the country, and will display information vital to them such
as contact details of the customer’s Diplomatic Mission in Sri Lanka,
the respective currency rates and the special Dialog hotline for them to
call-in for connectivity related queries.
The free travel guide will enable tourists to explore Sri Lanka with
ease at all times with the help of the mobile directory. The travel
guide provides customers with a variety of information pertaining to
various public services such as banking, aviation, transportation,
healthcare as well as travel-related information including popular
tourist sites, hotels, shopping malls, restaurants and entertainment
services. The hotline also gives customers access to emergency services
such as the police hotline, General Hospital, Red Cross, the fire
department and the 24-hour Dialog Roaming call centre. Customers could
avail of this service by dialing 778.
In an effort to enable travellers to stay in touch with loved ones
while in Sri Lanka and to enhance customer convenience, Dialog provides
inbound roamers with free Wi-Fi connectivity at Dialog hot spots across
the island along with the added benefit of free internet usage. All
in-bound roamers are eligible for this service and will receive the
username and password of their Wi-Fi account upon arrival in Sri Lanka.
Girawa partners Tigo
Girawa (www.girawa.com), a global voice services provider recently
partnered, Tigo.
“We are happy to have entered into this partnership, as we believe
that Girawa’s global reach will enable us to extend our services to
overseas Sri Lankan community and in turn introduce our services to more
customers in Sri Lanka”, Tigo, CEO Dumindra Ratnayaka said.
“We are delighted and honoured to have joined hands with Tigo, who
pioneered mobile telephone services in Sri Lanka. The partnership with
Tigo will enable us to provide innovative communication solutions to Sri
Lankan expatriates worldwide.
Our customers overseas and their friends and families in Sri Lanka
can now call each other through Girawa/Tigo networks at very competitive
rates. With Tigo’s wide network footprint and superior quality of
service, our customers can enjoy world class communication services in
the most cost-effective way”, said Girawa, CEO Sathya Weerasooriya.
Girawa, a pioneer in IP based voice services, is fully owned and
operated by Sri Lankan professionals and licenced in the United States
by Federal Communications Commission (FCC) as an International
Telecommunication Services Provider.
It has been in operation since 2004 helping Sri Lankan expatriates to
be in contact with their families and friends back in Sri Lanka in the
most economical way. Girawa runs all its IP based applications on the
cutting-edge Amazon Cloud Computing environment in the USA providing
highly reliable and secure service to its customers.
Currently, Girawa has local sales and customer service offices in
USA, Canada, UK and Australia and a 24x7 Help Desk in Sri Lanka
providing friendly and personalized customer service.
Girawa and Tigo will initially offer various communication plans for
Girawa customers in USA, Canada and Australia.
Those customers can order Tigo mobile phones for their friends and
families in Sri Lanka, and call each other free or at very low rates,
enabling them to save over 60 percent.
More importantly, the overseas Girawa customer can completely manage
the account and pay all the charges giving their Sri Lanka contacts the
absolute freedom in using this service.
‘Trust in your tomorrow, today’:
Union Assurance’s new image reaches the hearts of the people
From a platform of care to a platform of trust, Union Assurance has
transformed its image in the insurance sector with a new look, a new
brand promise and a new tagline.
The insurer also launched a new campaign recently to communicate its
new brand promise straight to the hearts of the people. The
advertisements in all three languages captures how the insurer
understands the inner individual, his life cycle and the effort it took
to achieve what he has. “Only you know what you have been through,” the
advertisements point out, “And we understand and respect that efforts.”
By understanding his inner conscience, Union Assurance respects each
individual, and that respect makes the insurer better able to serve and
cater to the need of each customer with an unbreakable trust.
From the tireless efforts of a Kandyan dancer to the deep bonds
between a father and daughter, the heart warming campaign is in line
with the insurer’s new image of strength, stability, loyalty and joy.
Union Assurance Chief Executive Officer Dirk Pereira explained that
though the brand promise has changed, the core values of the insurer
remains strong.
“We have a fresh brand promise that was created to deliver an
unparalleled level of trust,” he said. “Trust is the most important
factor in our business because at the end of the day, insurance is a
long-term agreement and the consumer looks for a trusted partner to work
with,” he said.
The new brand symbolizes this value proposition by combining a warm
orange and a firm grey in an unbreakable link of energy and strength.
“We are building on the trust that we have acquired in over two decades
of business in the insurance sector,” Pereira said. “And we are now
geared to build on that success,” he said.
The process of rebranding the Union Assurance image however, came
after extensive research. Marketing and Distribution General Manager
Rukman Weeraratne said, “We at Union Assurance kept our ear to the
ground and felt the heartbeat of the consumer clearly. We know what they
are looking for and we have equipped ourselves to service their needs.”
“In Union Assurance, we have two lines of business. Our extensive
internal and external research showed that in general insurance, the
people primarily look for convenience, while in the life insurance
sector, they look for transparency. We combine the values of
transparency and convenience with respectfulness from the corporate
level,” he said.
For life insurance, transparency was key with customers needing the
assurance that what they saw is what they got. Clarity is vital in life
insurance, he explained as it was a long-term agreement with the firm so
the customer needed to know what he would end up with clearly, in the
end.
The new brand look combines sunshine orange which represents energy,
joy and happiness with gray, which denotes a concrete colour of strength
and stability. “The logo is also easy and flexible to the eye with no
rough edges,” he said. “It reflects us as a company. We are easy to deal
with and flexible,” he said. The new brand also comes with a new and
timely tagline, “Trust in your tomorrow, today.”
Tech. ed 2010 in February:
Preparing organizations for tomorrow’s challenges
Tech.Ed 2010 is Microsoft’s premier technical education and
networking event for any technology professional interested in leading,
connecting and exploring a broad set of current and soon to be released
Microsoft technologies, tools, platforms and services.
Set to take place from February 8 to 10 at Waters Edge, Battaramulla,
the event offers all those interested an opportunity to meet, interact
and connect with international and local product group experts, industry
speakers and community influencers to get expert advice and have their
questions answered.
Tech.Ed events are famed for their contribution to technology in
every field, as well as for being a platform for the most innovative
thinkers of our time to share experiences and ideas.
Technology professionals and young enthusiasts will find the
opportunity to take their knowledge to the next level, building a
community network for the future. Participants will be exposed to the
best of what is available in the field of IT, helping them realize the
full scope of the technology itself, as well as reach their own true
potential.
Microsoft Sri Lanka Country Manager, Sriyan de Silva Wijeyarathne
emphasized the impact Tech.Ed would have on the IT community “Tech.Ed is
hailed as one of the most informative and cutting edge seminars ever to
be introduced.
This year’s event will feature speakers from all over the world;
bringing a massive pool of talent and skills to one place for the
purpose of taking technology in Sri Lanka to the next level.
The networking and contacts that are established at the seminar -
both between the participants and Microsoft, as well as among themselves
- will be a stepping stone for the future”, he said.
Featuring speakers such as Microsoft Sri Lanka, Senior Technical
Product Manager Jason Buffington, Microsoft Corporation, Asia Timezone,
unified Communications Strategist Raj Natarajan, and Microsoft
Technologies, Technology Architect Brian Phul, the event will also
include technical exhibitions, a student PC lab, gaming centres and an
extensive collection of stalls for both local and international tech
companies to exhibit and market their products.
Tech.Ed will explore aspects of current and soon-to-be-released
Microsoft technologies, tools, platforms and services, providing
participants with the chance to immerse themselves in over 200 IT
learning opportunities and share knowledge and ideas, as well as
influence the creation of technology resources to help build
state-of-the-art software solutions as well as to boost local IT
infrastructure.
Tech.Ed also promises a high degree of value for corporate
participation including seminars on efficiency through automation and
Green Computing.
Other seminars will cover Virtualization, Security, Identity and
Access, Unified Communications and Business Intelligence and Database
platforms.
At the workshop |
Standard Chartered Bank’s SME unit recently organized a special
workshop on Trade Finance for its SME clientele, sharing best practices
linked to CSR efforts, bringing the global knowledge to the local market
and creating a value proposition. This was the first such program
organized by Standard Chartered Bank for this segment to educate and
support its SME clients.
The workshop was conducted by Standard Chartered Bank Head of Trade
Services Janaka Serasinghe and was well received by the clients, most of
whom represented Shipping, Finance and Import and Export
specializations. The bank will continue to conduct these advisory
sessions throughout the year in a bid to support their business growth
and share groups knowledge and expertise.
Head of Consumer Banking Anirvan Ghosh Dastidar said, “SME businesses
are an important and growing business segment in Sri Lanka. This program
is a testimony to the importance Standard Chartered Bank places on the
SME sector. We are glad to be leading the way in being “the Right
Partner” for SMEs in Sri Lanka.”
Standard Chartered Bank currently provides a select array of
specialized services to Small and Medium size businesses. |