27 business leaders receive awards :

Graetian Gunawardhana is APEA Entrepreneur

Graetian Gunawardhana, Chairman & Managing Director of Hands Group of Companies, one of the largest producers of Industrial Gloves in Sri Lanka, carried away the APEA Entrepreneur of the Year 2013 Award at the awards ceremony sponsored by NDB in Colombo .

Dulith Herath, Chairman of Kapruka.com (Pvt) Ltd.,a entrepreneur who is extremely passionate about building a brand that will stand as the corner stone of Sri Lanka’s e-commerce was adjudged APEA Young Entrepreneur of 2013.

Hanif Yusoof,Group CEO & Director of Expolanka Holdings PLC, the dynamic entrepreneur also spearheads group business interests in several diverse sectors in Freight & Logistics, Travel &Leisure, International Trading & Manufacturing and Strategic Investments & Services sectors, was the winner of the APEA Special Achievement Award 2013 Sri Lanka.

Another 24 leading Sri Lankan business leaders too received the “Asia Pacific Entrepreneurship Awards in different categories.

APEA is a regional recognition programme for outstanding entrepreneurs across Asia. It is also a platform for Asian business leaders and entrepreneurs to network, share information and form lifetime acquaintances and alliances. The awards are presented in 12 countries throughout Asia, including Bangladesh, Brunei, China, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Vietnam.

Sri Lanka was invited to join this elite group from 2012. Enterprise Asia a non-governmental organization for entrepreneurship, based in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia, is the owner and organizer of this prestigious Asia Pacific Entrepreneurship Awards (APEA) since 1997.

“Enterprise Asia, in Association with Sri Lanka Malaysia Business Council (SLMBC) took the challenge to organize this event in Sri Lanka from 2012 onwards and this is the second consecutive year of the Sri Lanka event,” said Dushy Jayaweera, President of SLMBC.

Russell De Mel, Chief Executive Officer, NDB said, “the bank believes in developing an entrepreneurial culture, while observing with great admiration small businesses evolving to medium scale and some even to large scale ventures.

NDB’s sponsorship for the second successive year of the APEA, stands testament to its commitment to enable Sri Lanka’s entrepreneurs to move to an international platform”In recognition of the national importance of this event, ANCL Group newspapers Daily News & Sunday Observer, along with ART TV joined as Media Partners and KPMG as the Audit Partner. Cinnamon Grand Colombo was the hotel partner for the event. All Sri Lankan winners of APEA 2013 will be invited to the annual Asia Entrepreneur Forum in 2013 which is a gathering of 1,000 APEA winning Entrepreneurs of Asia, a network of Asia’s most powerful Entrepreneurs.

(SS)