Aeturnum Lanka celebrates five years of innovation

By Cassandra Mascarenhas

Provider of enterprise software development services and solutions Aeturnum Lanka, a subsidiary of US-based Aeturnum Inc. celebrated its fifth anniversary this month since its establishment in Sri Lanka in 2006.

From left: Aeturnum Lanka Director Software Services and Engineering Menuke De Silva, Aeturnum Lanka CTO and Head of Operations Hussain Shabbir, Senior Minister of International Monetary Cooperation Dr. Sarath Amunugama, Aeturnum Inc. President and CEO Rajat Bhakhri, Embassy of the United States Economic Officer L. Alex Kahl, American Chamber of Commerce in Sri Lanka President Vijaya Ratnayake and ICTA Programme Head Fayaz Hudah – Pic by Daminda Harsha Perera

Since its humble beginnings in Colombo with a few employees to a 100 plus team today, the company has played a vital role in Sri Lanka’s IT arena, working closely with both the public and private sectors in the country, contributing positively towards the country’s goal of growing ICT exports to one billion dollars by 2016.

With plans to expand by adding 100 more employees over the next two years, Aeturnum Lanka has positioned itself for continued success by delivering outstanding customer service and partnering with some of the biggest names in the global IT platform including Microsoft, Oracle, Sun Microsystems and Apple to name just a few.

“With the budget just around the corner, this is a very important time for us as we need to evaluate certain sectors, including that of IT which has been identified as a thrust sector and by reaching $ 500 million this year, this sector has proved to be one that can grow very fast,” stated the Chief Guest at the celebration of the company’s milestone, Minister of International Monetary Cooperation Dr. Sarath Amunugama.

“The economic growth of India was fuelled by a great extent by the large expansion of the IT sector and there is no reason why Sri Lanka can’t do the same in improving this sector.”

He noted that while the country boasts a strong education infrastructure, there is still a huge gap between the education and the marketability of graduates and called for the progress of science and technology to minimise this imbalance.

“We have a lot of advantages in comparison to other countries but we have much more to do and I encourage the private sector to develop such sectors on their own initiative while the Government plays a regulatory role,” he added.

The company provides product engineering, implementation and integration services to emerging technology providers and Global 2000 organisations. It also has specific development expertise in a number of technology domains including employee and customer-facing business portals, mobile applications, business intelligence, software quality assurance and testing, e-billing and online self-service.

Since the establishment of the parent company in Boston in 2001, the company has expanded out of North America into Europe, Middle East and the Asia Pacific.

“2011 has proved to be the best year in the history of Aeturnum with the company achieving a bigger and diverse customer base, further infrastructure development and substantial increase in revenue. One important area that Aeturnum Lanka will play a key role is when we actively look towards serving more customers in India and the Middle East and more in the Asia Pacific rim,” said Aeturnum Founder and CEO Rajat Bhakhri.

Aeturnum Inc. plans on increasing focus towards mobile solutions and mobile gaming, which Bhakhri described as being the mainstay in the industry for the foreseeable future, as well as enterprise search and collaboration and product engineering. The company will maintain its product and development initiatives while increasing their sales effort in India, Singapore and Malaysia.

Addressing the gathering, the Embassy of the United States Economic Officer L. Alex Kahl said: “There is a need for new thinking as the country moves forward and Sri Lanka now has a tremendous opportunity to maximise economic development and should drive this by hiring value added industries to achieve the goals set by the Government. Aeturnum’s growth in Sri Lanka is an excellent example of how a US company can contribute to Sri Lanka growing and moving towards establishing a knowledge hub.”

He also emphasised on the need for intellectual property rights in Sri Lanka as it would prove to be key when attracting investors and building a knowledge hub.