SriLankan Entrepreneur.

Mr. W. K. H. Wegapitiya

Chairman of Laugfs Holdings Ltd

Mr. W. K. H. Wegapitiya is currently the Chairman of Laugfs Holdings Ltd, having started his career as a “Shipping Trainee” at Ceylon Shipping Corporation, Sri Lanka’s premier Shipping Company.He has completed a course of study at Energy School affiliated to the Oxford University and a BSC Degree from the Vidayalankara University before his advent in to corporate business.His entrepreneurial startup began in 1990, with a capital of SLR. 5,000. With the knowledge and experience gained, he incorporated Gas Auto Lanka (Pvt) Ltd., which was the pioneering effort in introducing LPG as an alternative fuel for motor vehicles in Sri Lanka.

Laugfs today is a household word today, with a portfolio of fifteen companies, engaged in a wide spectrum of manufacturing and marketing activities.
He subsequently incorporated Laugfs Gas (Pvt) Ltd as the Flagship company of the Laugfs Group which today is the second largest downstream LPG player in the country, having gained almost 30% market share within seven years. Within a span of merely 12 years, he developed and led a vast business conglomerate having an average annual turnover well over Rs.7 billion, today.

He is a recipient of many awards which include the Entrepreneur of the Year Award granted by the Federation of Chambers of Commerce and Industry in Sri Lanka, for outstanding business performances in 2001 & 2004 and also the National Gold Award in 2005

The Asian Grid Award recognizes Excellence in Entrepreneurship on the International scale. The Laugfs Group of Companies have been making strategic management initiatives, having chosen a corporate strategy of extensive diversification, both in terms of concentric and conglomerate expansion. Laugfs recently ventured out into attaining multi – national status, having successfully gained entry into Australia, pioneering as an Asian Company, fully geared to convert petroleum driven vehicle to LPG Gas. The Australian government has granted considerable monetary incentives to LAUGFS in the venture.

Mr Wegapitiya is the person who makes the difference to the country through his innovative and creative ideas. We have lot of things to gain from his career. Also he is a very good and very attractive person in his voice.

Steve Jobs' Best Quotes Ever

Steve Jobs is great at playing the countercultural icon. He's a college dropout who once backpacked around India looking for spiritual enlightenment, and he takes only $1 a year in salary. There are righteous battles to fight, and with Macs and iTunes and iPhones, Jobs fights them, taking on the entrenched megaliths that try to dictate our tastes in computers and music and mobile phones.

But don't let the black mock turtleneck and denim trousers fool you. More than anything else, Jobs is a canny CEO who knows how to sell product. Steve Wozniak was the technical genius behind the first Apple computer; Jobs saw the marketability. He now presides over a company with $24 billion in annual sales and 22,000 employees. Jobs, 53, is revered by tech and design geeks, but the world's business-school students may have the most to learn from him. Apple's stock has shot up more than 70% over the past year, thanks to Jobs' strategy of focusing on his most profitable customers and coming up with new things to sell them—the ultra-thin MacBook Air most recently—rather than just chasing more market share.

Jobs may be a celebrity CEO, but he doesn't jump out of airplanes or traipse around Africa with bundles of cash. He is always in character and always on message, so much so that when late-night TV parodies him, he's invariably rolling out some new iProduct . Jobs gets called mercurial, egomaniacal, a micromanager. If that sounds a little like a CEO doing his job, maybe that's because he is—and a mighty fine one.

One of the great things about Steve Jobs is what comes out of his mouth.
The CEO of Apple Computer is a master of hype, hyperbole and the catchy phrase. Even when he's trying to talk normally, brilliant verbiage comes tumbling out.
Here's a selection of some of the most insanely great things the man has said, organized by topic: innovation and design, fixing Apple, his greatest sales pitches, life's lessons, taking the fight to the enemy and Pixar.

On Innovation and Design:

• "It's rare that you see an artist in his 30s or 40s able to really contribute something amazing."

-- At age 29, in Playboy, February 1985

• "I've always wanted to own and control the primary technology in everything we do."

-- BusinessWeek Online,Oct. 12, 2004

• "Innovation has nothing to do with how many R&D dollars you have. When Apple came up with the Mac, IBM was spending at least 100 times more on R&D. It's not about money. It's about the people you have, how you're led, and how much you get it."

-- Fortune, Nov. 9, 1998

• "It's really hard to design products by focus groups. A lot of times, people don't know what they want until you show it to them."

-- BusinessWeek, May 25 1998

• "It comes from saying no to 1,000 things to make sure we don't get on the wrong track or try to do too much."

-- BusinessWeek Online, Oct. 12, 2004

• "(Miele) really thought the process through. They did such a great job designing these washers and dryers. I got more thrill out of them than I have out of any piece of high tech in years."

-- Wired magazine, February 1996

Greate Minds In Entrepreneur

VISIONARY ENTREPRENEURS

Bill Gates The digital demagogue earned billions by anticipating the market's needs. Now, his philanthropic foundation is helping countless others across the globe.

Henry Ford founded Ford Motor Co. in 1903 when “horseless carriages” were available only to a wealthy few. Ford’s innovative vision helped produce the first reliable, affordable “automobile for the masses,” and spark a modern industrial revolution.

Mary Kay Ash Innovative, charismatic and contagiously optimistic, perhaps no woman has played a more important role in the advancement of women entrepreneurs than Mary Kay Ash.

Sam Walton Part P.T. Barnum, part Billy Graham, Sam Walton single-handedlybuilt Wal-Mart into the biggest retailer in the world, transformingthe way America shopped and making himself one of the world’srichest men in the process.

Phil Knight In 1993, the man whom The Sporting News voted “the most powerful person in sports” wasn’t an athlete, a manager or a team owner.

Entrepreneur has formula for success

Frank Sabatini is a diversified businessman who has made money in pizza, banking, convenience stores and ranching.In the late 1960s and early 70s, he implemented a model for growing his Pizza Hut business that has served him well in other enterprises.

He would get two partners to join him in a group. The first person would be the day-to-day manager and would get 20 percent ownership without putting any money down.

The next person was the supervisor, who would go on the line financially with Sabatini but would supervise the day-to-day manager with the goal of creating more restaurants. With multiple locations, the expenses per restaurant would go down and profits would go up. The third person would be Sabatini, who handled the legal work and finance.

Sabatini had groups in Kansas, Nebraska, Mississippi, Kentucky and Ohio. At his peak, he had ownership in more than 60 Pizza Huts. He sold most of his stores, but today he and Don Hazlett, of Lawrence, operate several stores in Kentucky and Ohio.

Wint Winter Sr., a former senator from Ottawa, has been a partner in business with Sabatini for many years. They used to play football together at KU and went to law school together. Winter said Sabatini is an "intelligent, capable person who is interested in the welfare of others. And he's easygoing. Frank is a people person. He can understand what makes you tick."

Sabatini likes to bring partners in like family.

"Most of my partners have done extremely well and are my best friends," Sabatini said. "They've made me what I am today. If I'm anything today, it's my partners that made me look good."

The Chicago native has flourished in Topeka and believes the community has more to offer budding entrepreneurs. Sabatini has owned Capital City Bank since 1979. Since then it has grown to 100 employees and $365 million in assets from 15 employees and $18 million in deposits since 1979. Sabatini is now chairman emeritus of the bank, and his son Matt is chairman. His other sons -- Marc, Mike and Dan -- serve on the board, along with his pizza business partner, Hazlett.

Italian roots

Sabatini's parents, Carmine and Lisetta Arquilla Sabatini, were from Raiano, Italy, a village surrounded by mountains near the Adriatic Sea, about two and a half hours east of Rome.

"My mother's family grew grapes," Sabatini said. "My dad's family were truck farmers. They raised cherries and figs and produce for their own consumption."

Seeking more opportunities than those available in Raiano, Carmine Sabatini moved in 1930 to South Chicago, where other Raiano natives lived. He worked for South Side Cement Co. One of Frank Sabatini's sisters was born in Italy, but he and another sister were born in the United States shortly after their parents settled in Chicago.

Frank Sabatini

• Background: Born 1932 in Chicago to immigrant Italian parents
• Business interests: Banking, Pizza Huts, ranching
• Favorite book: "The Power of Positive Thinking" by Norman Vincent Peale.
• His first Pizza Hut: 1969 at 8th and Iowa in Lawrence.
• Bought Capital City Bank: 1979

How to Become A Rich Person

To Become rich, there are many avenues that you need to explore. In fact, the are many ways to make money: a daily job, trade stock, trade foreign exchange, make money online, investment in bonds, investment in property. Each of these options requires a different level of capital to start with.

Usually, online money requires little monthly expenses to build and host a website say 10-20 dollars. Other types of trading online such as stock trading or foreign exchange require a fair capital say 10,000 dollars. You may even find a way of earning money online by filling online surveys.

They pay between 5-75 dollars per survey.

The first step in the journey to be rich is not to accumulate debt. If you intend to have your own business, avoid debt problems and bad debts. Avoid the idea of filing a bankruptcy or chapter 11. It will take you years to have a good credit rating by the credit rating agencies.

Debt problems can never disappear magically from your life. Accumulating debt is easy and progressive, but getting ride of it is uphill journey. It all depends on how much debt you have and how much your income is.

Before we start on how to reduce your debt problems, you should always aim for no further borrowing. You need a car? Just save for it. Become a saver and cash buyer from now on.

When you have debt problem, it is time to think about increasing your income as well. Another job or utilize a skill that never though you have, or starting a business that almost cost nothing is a good start. Think of starting your website and sell advertisement on it. This site www.money-from-website.com should help you start with such an idea.

When you think of applying for a loan, think how much do you need. Most importantly, think of how much you can afford paying off the loan using a worst case scenario. You will always need to buy pair of shoes, a new trouser or something for the person you love. So, avoid having debt problems by
thinking that you can pay off the load quickly because you intend to squeeze your expenses.

Open SWISS BANK Account.

To most people having a Swiss Bank Account is something for the super rich, crooks, dishonest government officials or just a good way of "hiding away one's ill-gotten gains." That's nothing but fiction and a common plot used over and over again in a lot of Hollywood's B movies. There's nothing illegal or "fishy" about wanting, or having a Swiss bank account.

Opening a Swiss Bank Account is not to be confused with the opening of a Swiss Private Bank Account or any other Offshore Bank Accounts, the services offered are varied. Swiss Banks welcome accounts from foreign residents all over the world. The main reason for wanting a Swiss bank account has to deal with the legendary privacy such an account provides

Steps

1. Investigate which Swiss Bank Account Services you require, they include Wealth Management, Investment Solutions, Venture Capital and Trust Formations, to name but a few.
2. Know that If you're looking for a way to "protect' assets from snoopy investigators, a Swiss account can be the ideal place.
3. Have your privacy held in the utmost confidentiality in a Swiss Bank Account
4. Contact an established bank in Switzerland.
5. The Swiss Bank will advise you on the best options available for you.

Tips

• If you have liquid assets worth $300,000 or more you may wish to investigate Swiss 'Private' Banking further as their are a wide array of services offered for substantial amounts.
• The Swiss have some of the tightest regulations in the entire world as far as who can gain access to your account.
• Currently an estimated one-third of all funds held outside their country of origin are kept in Switzerland.

Internet enabled our success

When I going through how we can use internet for our success I have found some good article and good example on that. Read this and take what you get from that.

The great grandson of Sir Paul Getty, the founder of one of the most profitable media companies in the world, has declared the internet as the master key in turning his photography empire into a worldwide success.
Speaking to the Independent’s Media Weekly, Mark Getty explained that the internet has won the company subscription agreements with 55 of the top 100 US newspapers, compared to none three years ago.
Launched in London in 1995, Getty Images now boasts 40 million photographs dating back to 1860 and claims to provide coverage of a photographic event in greater depth than any single newspaper.
“The internet promised so much to so many businesses and has delivered so little to so many and an enormous amount to so few,” said Mark Getty, speaking alongside business partner, Jonathan Klein.
“We are one of the ultimate internet businesses. Our cost of distribution has gone from very high to virtually nothing.”
This transformation has left the two business partners with a media empire generating £355m a year, on the back of selling images to advertising campaigns, marketers, websites and leading newspapers.
Their agreement with the Mirror Group UK is a fitting example of how publications themselves market the Getty brand by being able to fill their publication with an endless stream of supplied images.
According to Mr Getty, this is a process that will expand in the future as newspapers and publications continue to reduce their dependency on staff photographers.
“We probably have more accredited photographers at the Olympic Games than the British media combined, so by definition we can cover an event in greater depth and breadth than a single newspaper.”
For all its said-volume and expectantly bright future, Getty Images only employs 120 photographers that manage to add 40,000 images every year.
Klein believes it is little wonder that the company’s photographers “absolutely love it because they have way more freedom than working for the Associated Press or Press Association.”
“Fundamentally their freedom derives from them being photo-journalists.
There’s no one writing the story” he added, “they are allowed to tell the story with pictures.”
And the difference between a photograph of Tiger Woods taken by AP, a PA snapper or an image captured by a Getty photographer?
Simple, says Klein. The GI photographer must “capture defining emotion around the moment, so they can literally be focusing on his wife or someone in the crowd and try and get a completely different shot.”
For the future, the company said it hopes to pre-empt the needs of publications, by creating a research team to identify trends, so that a portfolio is potentially available before it is requested by its network of global clients.

Management TIps

Fix the problem, not the blame. It is far more productive, and less expensive, to figure out what to do to fix a problem that has come up than it is to waste time trying to decide whose fault it was.

Tell people what you want, not how to do it. You will find people more responsive and less defensive if you can give them guidance not instructions. You will also see more initiative, more innovation, and more of an ownership attitude from them develops over time.

Manage the function, not the paperwork. Remember that your job is to manage a specific function within the company, whatever that may be. There is a lot of paperwork that goes with the job, but don't let that distract you from your real responsibility.

Don't DO Anything. Your job as a manager is to "plan, organize, control and direct." Don't let yourself waste valuable time by falling back on what you did before you became a manager. We know you enjoy it and you are good at it. That's why you were promoted. Now you need to concentrate your efforts on managing, not on "doing".

You never have to make up for a good start. If a project or a job gets off to a bad start it can be difficult to catch up. Do your planning up front so you get a good start and you won't regret it.

Get out of your office. Management by Walking around (MBWA) does work. You make yourself more approachable. You get information first-hand. You find out what's really happening.

Lead by example. If you ask your employees to work overtime, be there too. Just because company policy allows it, don't fly first-class if your associates are in coach on the same plane. Be a leader - it's tougher than being a manager, but it's worth it.

Delegate the easy stuff. The things you do well are the things to delegate. Hold on to those that are challenging and difficult. That is how you will grow.

Don't get caught up in 'looking good'. "Work happily together. Don't try to act big. Don't try to get into the good graces of important people, but enjoy the company of ordinary folks. And don't think you know it all. Never pay back evil for evil. Do things in such a way that everyone can see you are honest clear through."

'Quality' is just conformance to requirements. You get the behavior you critique for, so set your standards and then require conformance to them. Quality will come from that effort, not from slogans, posters, or even threats.

Learn from the mistakes of others. You can't live long enough to make them all yourself.

Follow this path to become an entrepreneur.......

An entrepreneur is someone who creates his or her own business, and moves for the success. There is nothing better than becoming an entrepreneur and it is nothing to do to become your own boss. Following steps will help you to clear your path.

1. Think of a great and different idea. If a great idea comes to you, evaluate if it is realistic. Think of cost, manufacturing time, and popularity. Ask and record if people would actually buy the product. If you don't have an idea yet, it is a good start to think of your target market first. Then brainstorm a list of things like places they shop, things they like, and things you like. Narrow the list down to about three items, keeping cost, manufacturing time, and popularity in mind. And also it should be different one. And find out most easiest and realistic idea.

Or, think of a terrible idea. Really, you can't tell if a business idea is great or terrible until you try it in a real marketplace. Years later, the successful ideas are "obviously" good, but when they first began, most people rejected them. Google is one of the most famous examples—"Search is done. Does the world need yet another search engine?"—but many less-spectacular successes have strong arguments against them. There is always a good reason against a good idea. It doesn't really matter how good your initial idea is, because you're going to change it, anyway.

2. Write a business plan. The second step is writing a business plan. Include details and descriptions, and plan everything out realistically. Take your time and evaluate your product at each section. Good business plane should include following topics.
• Product description: What is your product? What kind of materials need for it. Make it eye catching.
• Market Analysis: Who is your targeted market? Where do they shop? Where are they located, product for whom?
• Competition: Who are your competitors? What are their strengths? Current state of the market, how will you beat them?
• Marketing: How will you market your product? What kind of image do you want to display? Where will you advertise? What is your tagline? What is your packaging like?
• Sales: Where will you sell? How will you get your customers to buy? When will you sell? What is your estimated sales forecast?
• Manufacturing: How do you going to make your product? Explain this in more detailed steps. What materials do you need to make your product? When and where will you manufacture? What is your COGS (cost of goods sold)?
• Finance: how much money do you need to start your business? What is your expected gross profict? And will possible to archive targeted profit?
  
  
  
3. Pitch your idea to Venture Capitalists to get money to start your company. If you have a good idea, they will love to invest their money in your company. Make a PowerPoint presentation explaining why your product is the best, including each part of your business plan in the presentation. Tell them how much your estimated gross profit is and how much percentage of that they will earn in interest. Make this as a interesting think.
   
   Or, don't look for or accept funding. Striking a deal with venture capitalists is a long, tiresome, difficult, and dangerous process. In the early days of a business, it can be a catastrophic distraction. "Distraction is fatal to start-ups."—Paul Graham. Many VCs are not set up to make you successful. A wonderful success for you might be to earn $80,000 a year doing work you love. Starting small and pleasing a small number of customers at first is a high-probability way to get there. A VC will not allow such a success to happen, because a VC's strategy is to become a billionaire by rolling the dice on many low-probability but potentially gigantic-returning businesses. The price you pay for taking on a VC is control: control of your dream. If you can get the business started without spending a lot of money that might be your best route.

4. Sell. Sell and distribute your product. If you're getting revenue, then you're in business. You're testing your theories about the market, you're finding out what really works and what doesn't, and you're getting fuel for more ideas and improvements. If you're not getting revenue, then it's all in your head.

5. Hang out with entrepreneurs. By meeting entrepreneurs socially, you gain contacts and hear about opportunities. More importantly, you learn how entrepreneurs think. You pick up their attitudes, their nose for opportunity, and their willingness to explore every idea and its opposite (they know that often both work), their contraries nature, the great diversity in their styles. Always try to engage with them and try to get their experience for your success.