Stewardship and Governance

Mr Fernando has over 40 years of experience in the tea industry and has been successful in innovation, promoting, and marketing the traditional beverage of tea in many variants. He is the creator of the global tea brand HELADIV registered in 40 countries. He began his career as a Tea Taster at Carson Cumberbatch & Co., Ltd. In 1975. Mr Fernando joined Brooke Bond Ceylon Limited and served as a Manager in the Tea Department from 1979 to 1989 with a secondment of one year as a Tea Trader, at its headquarters in the United Kingdom in 1982.

In 1990, he established HVA Lanka Exports as a joint venture with the Dutch agricultural conglomerate HVA Holdings bv and expanded the organisation to include several subsidiary companies, HVA Foods PLC., HVA Beverages and HVA Holdings. He is also the Chairman and CEO of the HVA Group and Chairman of HVA Farms (Pvt) Ltd., an organic agro-resort in the NWP. He served on the Colombo Tea Traders Association as a member and also as a Director on the Sri Lanka Tea Board and as an Independent Director of the Sri Lanka Industrial Technology Institute from 2015 to 2016.

Mr Fernando functioned as the President of the National Chamber of Exporters in 2008 and 2009. He served as the elected Chairman of the Tea Exporters Association of Sri Lanka from 2014 to 2016. He is a National award winner since 1997 at the NCE Exports Awards and was selected “Exporter of the Year” winning Gold awards in four categories, in 1999. He was also awarded “Sri Lankan Entrepreneur of the year 2015,” winning the National Gold award and “Sri Lankan Entrepreneur of the year 2015,” with a Provincial Gold award.

He is a multidisciplined sportsman at school and represented and captained Sri Lanka at Rowing. He currently heads the Sri Lanka Amateur Rowing Association and is also a senior member of the National Olympic Committee.

He is an engineer by training. He has over thirty-five year’s experience in the corporate field, primarily with Motorola Corporation.

Mr Seneviratne obtained a Bachelor’s degree in Electronics from the University of Kent, UK and a Master's degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Calgary, Canada. He pursued a career in telecommunications starting in 1982 at the then Sri Lanka Telecommunications Department (present day SLT). In 1988, he became the head of engineering of Celltel, setting up South Asia’s first mobile telephone network.

In 1990 Mr Seneviratne accepted a position with Motorola Corporation and moved to Singapore on a regional role. During this period he developed Motorola’s relationship with SLT that enabled SLT to provide telephone service to remote areas including restoring telephone service to Jaffna in 1996.

Since leaving Motorola, Mr Seneviratne has carried out several professional consulting assignments in telecommunications and renewable energy, while engaging in rural electrification activities during his spare time. He was part of a team that set up four grid connected mini hydropower systems. He implemented Sri Lanka’s first off-grid village solar electrification system in 2001 and Sri Lanka’s first off-grid village biomass electrification system in 2004.

In the period 2006 to 2009, Mr Seneviratne was a member of the Board of Directors of Lanka Transformers Ltd. and its Chairman during the latter part. He was a member of the inaugural governing Board of the Sri Lanka Sustainable Energy Authority.

Currently Mr Seneviratne is a member of the Board of Directors of four mini hydropower companies – Messrs Escas Owala (Pvt) Ltd, Escas Ankanda (Pvt) Ltd, Escas Diggala (Pvt) Ltd, and Escas Kiula (Pvt) Ltd.

Mr Seneviratne is the recipient of the Year 1999 Motorola CEO Award for Volunteerism. For his voluntary services to the Department of Wildlife Conservation he was made an Honorary Director in the Department. For his innovation he was elected a Lemelson Fellow and for his sustainable development activities he was elected an Ashoka Fellow. On the 20th Anniversary of the Internet Society of Sri Lanka, he was recognised as one of twenty-five people having contributed to the early development of the Internet in Sri Lanka.

Mr Seneviratne is a Chartered Engineer and a Member of the Institution of Engineering & Technology, UK.

Mr Lawrence Paratz holds an MSc (Telecommunication Systems) with Distinction, and was awarded the Philips Prize from Essex University, and an MEng Sc from the University of Queensland.

He is a Fellow of Engineers Australia (FIEAust) and an alumnus of the Stanford University Executive Development Programme. He also holds a Bachelor's degrees in Science and Engineering (Honours). In 2011, he was elected as a Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering (ATSE).

Mr Paratz has more than 40 years experience in all facets of the telecommunication including mobile, fixed, broadband, satellite, and international networks both domestic and international. This includes capital and infrastructure development, operations, sales, customer service and regulatory issues. As a Director and Chief Executive of Acacia Australia Pty Ltd, he was responsible for development of an integrated proposal for delivery of national broadband communication for Australia.

He has served as a Director of Maxis Communication Berhad, Chairman of the Technology Committee of the Board, as a Director of Vernet Pty Ltd, a company providing ultra high speed Broadband to Universities and Research Establishments in Australia, and a former senior executive of Telstra Corporation. He also serves on the Board of Real Thing Entertainment Pty Ltd, an Australian high technology company and Razorback Pty Ltd, a company incorporated in Victoria, Australia.

Mr Paratz has had executive responsibility for multibillion dollar programmes and integrations including network transformations and deployments across multiple technologies, with extensive experience in international, metropolitan and regional and rural communications. He previously served as a member of the Board of the Australian Government's Internet Assistance Programme. He has been an invited speaker at the Australian Health Informatics Conference, and the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering.

He was formerly Chairman of the On-Trac@Peter Mac Adolescent and Young Adult Cancer Programme, and has been involved in a number of initiatives in e-health.

He counts over 40 years of experience in investment banking, general and financial management and accounting. He worked at Ernst & Young and Morgan, Grenfell & Co. Ltd. prior to joining the Usaha Tegas Sdn Bhd (“UTSB”) Group in 1992 as head of corporate finance. He serves on the Boards of several companies including Bumi Armada Berhad, Binariang GSM Sdn Bhd, Maxis Communications Berhad of Malaysia and Yu Cai Foundation.

Mr Chan holds an honours degree in Economics and Accounting from the University of Newcastle-upon-Tyne, United Kingdom and is a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of England and Wales.

She has over 35 years of experience in finance, procurement and audit areas in telecommunications, banking and government sectors. She was previously with Maxis Berhad and is currently the Finance Head of Maxis Communications Berhad. She is also a Non-Executive Director of a few subsidiaries of Maxis Communication Berhad.

Ms Lai holds a Bachelor of Commerce Degree from Melbourne University, Australia and is a Chartered Accountant of the Malaysian Institute of Accountants and a Certified Practicing Accountant of CPA Australia.

Mr Weerakoon is a senior legal practitioner who counts more than 36 years of experience as a civil and criminal counsel. He was appointed a Presidents Counsel in 2017.

He has served as a Director of Sinhaputhra Finance PLC and Deputy Mayor and Councilor of the Municipal Council of Matale and Central Provincial Councilor. He is also the Senior Legal Counsel of Sinhaputhra Finance PLC .

He is a special grade officer of the Sri Lanka Administrative Service (SLAS). Mr Seneviratne holds an Honours Bachelor’s Degree specialising in Chemistry from University of Kelaniya. He has obtained a Postgraduate Diploma in Business and Financial Administration from The Institute of Chartered Accountants of Sri Lanka and Master's in Business Administration from University of Colombo.

He joined the Sri Lanka Administrative Service in 1995. Upon completion of his in-service training year, he was appointed as an Assistant Director to the Department of Fiscal Policy of the Ministry of Finance in 1996. In 2006 he was assigned to the Department of National Budget of the same Ministry as a Director. In 2015, he was appointed as the Director General of the Department of Fiscal Policy. Since January 2018 Mr Seneviratne has been working as the Director General of the Department of National Budget until he was appointed as a Deputy Secretary of the Treasury in February 2018.

Mr Seneviratne has held several Directorships representing the Treasury on several Boards coming under the purview of Secretary to the Treasury, Ministry of Finance.

Possessing a Master's Degree in Business Administration (MBA) from the University of Colombo, a Postgraduate Diploma in Electronics and Telecommunications Engineering and a Bachelors of Science (BSc) Engineering Degree in Electrical and Electronics, Mr Rubasinghe is a Chartered Engineer and a Fellow of the Institution of Engineers Sri Lanka (IESL), a Fellow Member of Chartered Professional Managers of Sri Lanka (CPM), Certified Member of the Sri Lanka Institute of Marketing (SLIM) and an Associate Member of the Chartered Institute of Personnel Management (CIPM).

Under his stewardship, SLT Campus (SLTC) won “Most Emerging Education Institute of the Year” award at the South Asian Business Excellence Awards 2019 and was also recognised at the “National Business Excellence Awards 2019” in Sri Lanka. Starting as a University offering Engineering Degrees, under the visionary leadership of Mr Rubasinghe, within a short span of five years, SLTC has grown to be Sri Lanka’s only fully-fledged non-state university of global standards and draws parallels with existing state universities in the country, giving its students a holistic university life experience, offering a wide spectrum of study pathways. Further Mr Rubasinghe has guided and lead SLTC to become one of Sri Lanka’s premier research based universities of repute, focusing on research and innovation. In recognition of this success, and his visionary leadership, he was awarded the “The Education Leadership Award” at the Sri Lanka Education Leadership Awards 2019 and he was awarded with the Chartered Engineer of the Year 2011 award, at IESL’s Engineering Excellence Awards.

In his career spanning over 25 years he has more that 15 years of experience in the SLT Group and over eight years in the mercantile and financial sector.

He also functions as Company Secretary for Board Subcommittees and subsidiaries of SLT Group.