Novel instant tea vending machine developed

Shirajiv SIRIMANE

For the first time in the world, a Sri Lankan entrepreneur has designed an instant hot and cold tea portable vending machine capable of pouring hot and cold tea via SMS.

This model will be exported to Dubai, Korea, Japan, India and the Maldives and other neighbouring countries early next year.

The mentor behind the project, Ni-Cey international Chairman G L Thilakaratne said they will be installing these machines in public places in Colombo soon.

“Initially a person with a Mobitel connection could send a SMS to a pre given number and the machine will intercept this message and pour out the drink,” he said. The coin option too would be available.

He said that this process involves six messages going from one point to another but for the customer the process takes less than 20 seconds.

“This is actually 2020 technology being given today and more options would be added next year to the machine,” he said.

The machine branded as ‘TeLak’ has local technology and parts imported from Korea and Japan.

Thilakaratne was based in Japan since 1975 and he acquired the technical knowhow and decided to manufacture the machine in Sri Lanka.

The next stage of the machine would see ‘hot chocolate’ being introduced and ‘cans’ too will be introduced later.

He said that with tourism booming this product would be in demand as vending machines are a way of life overseas.

He said that though Sri Lanka produces the best tea in the world, more coffee machines were available and this prompted him to manufacture an instant tea machine to the local market. “TeLak Tea Maker is a new concept to the tea drinking industry,” he said.

The company also exports conventional and organic tea, instant tea in sachets in different flavours and natural spices and eco-friendly salt produced to IMO standards to Japan and many other countries.

“We have found that it is essential that we introduce natural products to our clients to live healthier lives. “We launched an associate company, Freight Consolidators Lanka (Pvt) Ltd, now the exclusive agents for Trico International in Japan.”