Textured Jersey Lanka PLC (TJL) emerged the overall victor at the World Textile Awards in London, by winning the topmost award across all categories and being bestowed the much sought after global title ‘Firm of The Year.’ Apart from the highest honour, Textured Jersey also won the World’s Top Spot in their respective category award as ‘Dyer & Finisher of the Year.’

Both awards are pinnacles in many ways and milestone to the Company as they journey towards becoming the Best Mill in this region. This is a first time achievement by a local fabric manufacturing company, helping place Sri Lanka on the map as a destination for World Class Manufacturing.

TJL, Sri Lanka’s leader in Weft knit Fabric manufacturing were selected as champions from amongst a large group of top global industrialists who represented seven different areas in the Apparel industry such as fibre, spinning, weaving and garment making. They beat competitors from UK, USA, China, India, Turkey and a dozen of leading destinies for textile and garments in their journey to the top.

The World Textile Awards, the premier platform for industry specialists from around the world to showcase their expertise, was created to recognise and reward companies that set the benchmark for others. The Companies, which went through a stringent selection process, were judged by an elite panel, comprising the industry’s most respected experts from across the globe; drawn from leading international textile organisations, institutions and companies.

The mission of the Awards, headquartered in London, is to provide a global platform to reward excellence amongst outstanding textile companies across the entire industry, from fibre production to end stitched product. The main supporting hand of the mission is Charted Institute for Clothing and Textiles and Footwear in UK which is a 90 year old globally recognized institute around the world with members in 70 countries.

Adrian Dinsdale, CEO of the World Textile Awards, commending the ‘Firm of the Year’ said, “We are delighted to give this award to Textured Jersey. The judges were impressed not only by the firm’s ability to meet our strict judging criteria but also by the immense enthusiasm and energy that came across in the submission.”

Sriyan de Silva Wijeyeratne, Managing Director of Textured Jersey, remarked: “This is an incredibly exciting award for us to win, and reflects the passion and dedication of the entire team. We have made it our vision to build a firm of global significance. Winning this prestigious title from the World Textile Awards is wonderful recognition of our efforts, and we are thankful to them for the honour. It certainly inspires us to reach greater heights. We will continue to draw from our rich heritage, our strong competencies, and our globally strong shareholders, to continue to bring excitement, and satisfaction to all our Customers and Partners, in a Sustainable manner, through Innovative high quality fabrics.”

TJL who is top of the class for their fabric innovations and reputed to meet the highest international standards in product quality, is amongst the LMD top 50 companies in Sri Lanka. The company has continually sustained an exceptionally high award winning standard, winning many Sustainability awards and were also crowned the Winners in the ‘Apparel, Textiles, Leather and manufacturing sector’ by the National Chamber of Commerce at the National Business Excellence Awards.

TJL who closed their financial year with a strong Ten Million Dollar profit and an impressive Share price appreciation, recently acquired Quenby Lanka, a state of the art fabric printing company . With ambitious aspirations backed by a dedicated and competent team, the company looks all set to steer their path towards a long-term growth phase and appears confident of staying the winning course.

Textured Jersey, was founded in Sri Lanka in 2001. Listed on the Colombo Stock Exchange, TJL is backed by two leading industrialists – Pacific Textiles Hong Kong and Brandix Lanka as its main shareholders. The company supplies to some of the best international brands including Marks & Spencer, Victoria’s Secret, Intimissimi, Tezenis and Calvin Klein.

The hunt has begun for Sri Lanka’s ‘big idea’ technology startups with the launch of the 2015 Global Startup Labs (GSL) Sri Lanka Challenge. This year, for the first time, Brandix will be joined by WSO2 to support this programme run by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).

This seven-week incubation programme is designed to identify, develop and commercialise successful technology-based enterprises. Undergraduates, graduates, working professionals and others who have innovative ideas for technology startups can apply online at http://bit.ly/1J09e7R before Wednesday 10th June 2015. The programme is scheduled to take place from 22nd June to 7th August 2015.

It will consist of three phases — ‘Ideate’, ‘Plan & Create’, and ‘Refine & Launch’. Modelled on the MIT-GSL global entrepreneurship incubator, the programme is run by MIT in collaboration with 15 international universities.

As the principal sponsor of the MIT-GSL Sri Lanka Challenge, top apparel manufacturer Brandix will assist in conducting it. This the second consecutive year that the Group has pledged to fund the MIT-GSL Sri Lanka programme in collaboration with MIT and other sponsors.

“We believe that technology will disrupt the apparel industry, sooner rather than later. We aim to be a pioneer in leading this game-changing initiative by MIT, and in the process we also aim to help create an innovation eco system in our country,” Brandix Director, Udena Wickremesooriya said.

This year’s co-sponsor WSO2, the open source technology company that is redefining enterprise middleware, will host the selected teams at the company’s office premises in Colombo and will provide guidance and valuable insights into successfully running a startup.

“A critical factor of our success today has been our ability to continuously innovate and empower our employees. We are thrilled to be a part of this venture which is driven on similar core values that provide opportunities to young and upcoming technological startups,” said Udeshika Ratnavira, vice president of HR and administration at WSO2.

The first MIT-GSL Sri Lanka programme supported by Brandix last year resulted in eight possible startups pitching their ideas to a panel of investors in Colombo in the ‘Refine & Launch’ phase of the programme.

Instructors from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology will be in Sri Lanka for six weeks as part of the 2015 programme, to take the selected startup teams from idea validation to prototype.

Representatives of Brandix and WSO2 will be responsible for managing and executing the programme and providing training and mentors for the selected participants.

Disrupt Unlimited, the Brandix-led start-up seed accelerator, has entered into a strategic tie-up with Regus, the world’s largest provider of flexible workspace solutions, to offer collaborative workspace to business start-ups incubated by the former.

Regus has undertaken to provide flexible office space solutions for start-up companies that are born out of the efforts of Disrupt Unlimited, a company set up to inspire and support the search for innovations that transform the way textiles and apparels are manufactured.

Encompassing selected Regus Centres in Sri Lanka, the agreement between the two companies envisages that Regus will provide fully-equipped office spaces, offer on-demand meeting room facilities, day office facilities and other services at special rates.

“Intelligent and collaborative work spaces are an integral component of the innovation eco-system,” said Udena Wickremesooriya, Disrupt Unlimited’s Director. “We are therefore delighted that a workspace solutions provider of the calibre of Regus has come forward to partner our search for potentially game-changing technological innovations for the apparel industry.”

He said Disrupt Unlimited constantly strives to partner with domain experts with the intention of strengthening and developing the eco-system for invention and innovation in Sri Lanka.

Dr. Nirmal De Silva, Regus Country Head for Sri Lanka said: “Regus is honoured to join hands with Disrupt Unlimited in its pursuit of driving innovation across the clothing industry in Sri Lanka. The clothing industry has been a leading contributor to the national economy. We feel that this strategic tie-up would support in creating the much needed ‘eco-system’ for disruptive innovation to take place in the industry. As the world’s largest provider of flexible workspace solutions with an unparalleled network of 3,000 centres in 106 countries, Regus is revolutionizing the industry with solutions for Start-ups, SMEs and large MNCs so that they can work anywhere, anytime in a flexible manner. We are confident that by working very closely with Disrupt Unlimited, we could definitely assist in revolutionising the clothing industry in the country as well.”

Launched in early 2014, Disrupt Unlimited runs an incubator and seed accelerator that seek to inspire, mentor and fund start-ups with breakthrough, technology-driven solutions to disrupt products, practices, processes and business models in the Apparel, Textile and Accessories sectors. The objective of the company is to encourage innovators from across industries to develop solutions that address challenges at every stage of the supply chains, leading to revolutionary changes in the way apparels, textiles and accessories are made, packaged, distributed and consumed.

The Brandix Group won the Cup Championship at the 2015 Inter-Firm Doubles Team Badminton tournament conducted by the Mercantile Badminton Association (MBA) beating Seylan Bank three games to one at the MBA Stadium.

The unbeaten Brandix A Team outplayed teams from Dialog, Commercial Bank and Nations Trust Bank in the group stage and semi-finals to reach the final on 28th June.

The Brandix team comprised of Laksara Aravinda (Captain), Nihal Amarasena, Imal Gurusinghe, Hasitha Premaratne, Janaka Gamage, Nirmal Perera, Ruwan Fernando, Sujani De Costa, Aveesha Dias and Roshni Fernando.

Meanwhile, the Brandix B Team secured fourth place at the Bowl Championship of the same tournament.

Pictured here is the Brandix A Team that won the Cup Championship at the 2015 MBA Inter-Firm Doubles Team Badminton tournament.

Twenty five aspiring Sri Lankan entrepreneurs, chosen from 100 candidates with ideas for potentially game-changing technology startups, have embarked on the 2015 MIT Global Startup Lab (GSL) programme in Sri Lanka conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in partnership with leading apparel manufacturer Brandix and WSO2, a leader in enterprise middleware.

Four MIT instructors are working with the GSL teams during the seven-week ‘incubation’ phase of the programme, designed to identify, develop and commercialise successful technology-based enterprises from idea validation to prototype by 7th August 2015 when the programme ends with a demo day pitch.

The decision this year to open up the programme to working professionals has significantly elevated the extent of domain knowledge and experience among the prospective startups, raising the intensity of the programme, according to Joseph Yang, the GSL Country Manager for Sri Lanka this year. Last year’s MIT-GSL Sri Lanka programme, also supported by Brandix, was limited to undergraduates and recent graduates.

The MIT-GSL Instructor team consists of Perla I. Villarreal (Technical Lead), a graduate of Computer Science and Engineering from MIT; Pallavi Mishra (Entrepreneurship Lead), a System Design & Management (SDM) fellow at MIT; Nitah Onsongo (Entrepreneurship Assistant), an undergraduate in Mechanical Engineering at MIT and Joseph Yang (Country Manager), also an SDM fellow at MIT.

As a co-sponsor of the MIT-GSL Sri Lanka programme for the second successive year, Brandix provides programmatic support in addition to mentorship and domain expertise to all teams.

“One of our principal focus areas is building an ecosystem for technological innovation,” said Udena Wickremesooriya, Director of Brandix. “The MIT-GSL Sri Lanka programme is one of several initiatives being supported by Brandix to stimulate technology startups, promote invention, innovation and advances in automation because we believe that the future of the apparel industry will be significantly technology-dependent.”

WSO2, the open source technology company that is redefining enterprise middleware is the co-sponsor of the 2015 MIT-GSL Sri Lanka programme. In addition to providing guidance and insights in the technology and IT domain, WSO2 is providing its training room at the WSO2 head office for the GSL classroom as well as helping to host the demo day at Trace City on 7th August.

The first MIT-GSL Sri Lanka programme supported by Brandix last year resulted in eight possible startups of which four teams found funding for commercialisation of their proposals.

After seven weeks of intense brainstorming guided by international and local trainers and mentors, seven prospective Sri Lankan startups pitched their ideas and business plans to a panel of investors in Colombo recently, bringing to a close the 2015 MIT Global Startup Lab (GSL) Sri Lanka programme supported by top apparel exporter Brandix and enterprise middleware specialist WSO2.

Innovative adaptation of Information and Communications Technology (ICT) for refined and more targeted products and services took centre stage, as the startups sought funding to commercialise ideas that could stimulate lifestyles, facilitate e-commerce and banking, assist and expedite recruitment and enhance education.

Conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in association with Brandix and WSO2, the MIT-GSL programme is designed to help identify, develop and commercialise successful technology-based enterprises.

The seven startups that pitched for funding at the ‘Demo Day’ were ‘Viral’ – a location-based social network that tells users what’s happening in their neighbourhoods; ‘Syna’ – a Unified Payment Gateway for SMEs to engage in e-commerce; ‘Prime HR’ – an intelligent application process for an inbound recruitment platform; ‘Pay Media’ – a payment kiosk that serves as an unmanned bank; ‘HandPiq’ – a specialised search engine based on an instant messaging user interface; ‘Captiosus’ – an online micro tutoring platform branded ‘Siplo’ for GCE (A/L) students and those awaiting university admission; and ‘ARton’ – an app for interactive learning using augmented reality and 3D modelling.

The panel of prospective investors to which these ideas were pitched comprised of Jeevan Gnanam, CEO of Orion City; investor and mentor Fayaz Hudah, Founder of ‘spiralation’ tech accelerator; Anarkali Moonesinghe, Deputy CEO of CIMB Investment Bank; Shehara De Silva, Founder of IDEAHA Institute of Social Design; Madu Ratnayake, Head of Digital, Senior Vice President and General Manager of Virtusa and Girish Anand Sobti, entrepreneur and investor.

“This was a committed and focused group that had the courage to visualise a new business and was then intensively coached on what it might take to realise its vision,” panellist Girish Anand Sobti said.

A spokesperson for the MIT team of instructors added: “GSL Sri Lanka 2015 has been a fulfilling and enriching experience for all of us. Several of our teams were approached for investment and mentorship opportunities from angel investors and successful entrepreneurs on the Demo Day. The feedback for the programme curriculum from our students has been very encouraging. We received tremendous support from our sponsors and local startup community during the entire duration of the programme. The enthusiasm to grow the entrepreneurship ecosystem by universities and corporates alike makes us hopeful that Sri Lanka’s entrepreneurial ecosystem will develop rapidly in the next few years.”

As a co-sponsor of the MIT-GSL Sri Lanka programme for the second successive year, Brandix provided programmatic support in addition to mentorship and domain expertise to the startup teams. WSO2, the open source technology company, provided guidance and insights in the technology and IT domain, and made available its training room at the WSO2 head office for the GSL classroom in addition to helping host the Demo Day.

The first MIT-GSL Sri Lanka programme supported by Brandix last year resulted in eight possible startups of which four teams found funding for commercialisation of their proposals.

‘Model Village’ programme provides water supply and sanitation facilities to key local institutions

The ancient Sri Lankan concept of village life revolving around the tank, the temple and the school has inspired Brandix to adopt a ‘model village’ approach to empowering communities in areas where the Group has a manufacturing presence.

A programme to identify and address water-related issues facing people resident within a five kilometre radius of the Group’s factories is implemented by providing water supply facilities to or upgrading existing infrastructure in schools, hospitals, places of worship, police stations and similar community locations.

Sri Lanka’s single largest apparel exporter plans to allocate Rs 5 million per model village project, through which its factories, usually one of the biggest employers in each community, become an intrinsic part of the social fabric of the village through their role as benefactors.

In a second phase, the Group said it envisages extending its largesse to an area within a 10 kilometre radius of its factories to empower people further afield.

The pilot project for this new model of community empowerment focussed on Polonnaruwa and has to date benefitted students and staff of nine schools in the district and the Kaduruwela police station.

Three of these schools, the Athumalpitiya Primary School, Sewamuktha Kandaura Navodya Maha Vidyalaya and Nagara Maha Vidyalaya have received drinking water facilities, while six others, the Galthabarawa Primary School, Wijayaraja Vidyalaya, Palugasdamana Maha Vidyalaya, Palugasdamana Primary School, Bandiwewa Maha Vidyalaya and Ananda Jayasekara Nursery have received assistance to build or repair their toilets and sanitation facilities, the company said. The police station received a new block of toilets for the use of its staff and visitors.

These projects directly benefit more than 6,000 school children and about 750 adults working in the institutions assisted, and help create greater affinity between the factory and the community, Anusha Alles, Head of CSR of the Brandix Group said.

“This new model village approach has a greater impact on the community than separate projects in different parts of the country, and builds a greater sense of mutual responsibility and belonging that makes the factory one of the indigenous institutions in the area,” she said.

For its second ‘model village’ Brandix has chosen Nivithigala in the Ratnapura District, Ms Alles disclosed.

Sri Lanka’s single largest apparel exporter, the Brandix Group’s principal CSR efforts are driven by the central corporate theme of ‘Water’ and constitute a long term commitment to increasing the availability of water and the provision of safe drinking water to those most in need.

Teams from the Brandix Group will vie for Mercantile Volleyball’s highest honours — the Men’s and Women’s Super League champions’ trophies — when they compete in the 2015 finals of the annual Mercantile Volleyball Association tournament on Sunday, 4th October.

Demonstrating the apparel manufacturing giant’s continuing passion for the game, teams from Brandix Intimate Apparel Minuwangoda dominated the preliminary rounds in the Super League to book their places in both the Men’s and Women’s finals.

The Men’s team defeated two other teams from the Brandix Group, Brandix Essentials Ratmalana and Brandix Casualwear Rideegama, as well as the teams of MAS Active Katunayake and SLT Human Capital Solutions on their way to the Super League final.

The Brandix Women’s team overcame Brandix Intimate Apparel – Uknits, Mirigama, and MAS Casualine Mawathagama to reach the Super League final.

Two other Brandix teams, Brandix Intimate Apparel – Uknits, Mirigama and Brandix Intimate Apparel Polonnaruwa won third place in the Women’s Super League and the Men’s Championship respectively.

In all, 96 teams representing mercantile sector entities competed in the preliminary rounds of this year’s tournament.

Sri Lanka’s single largest apparel exporter, Brandix conducts its own annual volleyball tournament for the ‘Rasadiya Kusalanaya’ (Mercury Trophy), which is considered the largest volleyball tournament organised by a private company in the country.

Brandix Intimate Apparel, Minuwangoda won the 2015 Mercantile Volleyball Men’s Super League beating MAS Linea Aqua – Kapugoda in four sets, 25-23, 14-23, 27-25, and 25-19, while the company’s Women’s team emerged runner-up in the same category. This is the second consecutive year that a Brandix Group company won this tournament.

Third place in the Women’s Super League also went to a Brandix company — Brandix Intimate Apparel – Uknits, Mirigama, while Brandix Intimate Apparel, Polonnaruwa was placed third in the Men’s Championship. The 2015 finals of the annual Mercantile Volleyball Association tournament took place on Sunday, 4th October at the National Youth Services Council Indoor Stadium in Maharagama.

In the Men’s Super League final won by Brandix Intimate Apparel, Minuwangoda, the company’s Ranga Fernando was adjudged Most Valuable Player of the Tournament, receiving a Bajaj Discover 125 Motorcycle for his feat, and was also adjudged Best Player in the finals, while team member Chathuranga Fernando won the award for Best Setter.

In all, 96 teams representing mercantile sector entities competed in the preliminary rounds of this year’s tournament.