I had the opportunity to read the success stories of many IT leaders , Sergy Brin & Larry Page , Bill Gates , etc to name a few. When I read these publications I dreamt of reading a success story of a son of our motherland one day. This was a wish. But I never thought that will be realized so soon. And I never thought that I’ll ever get an opportunity to do a write up on him. Well , my wish became a reality on a sunny afternoon on last Wednesday. I and my colleague met him at his office. He is Harsha Purasinghe. The CEO of Microimage , a comapny which is responsible for producing quitet a few IT BLOCKBUSTERS over the last decade. Lets start with the beginning. Microimage is a college startup. This was a fun club which is specifically meant for sharing of software and developing software for fun. At that time Harsha was the president of the college computer society. The first break through in their journey was the development of the SINHALA fonts to Windows 3.1 . Mind you , if you are a person who is not much savyy with this computer jargon , Belive me its not an easy thing. I would reckon it as a very complex time consuming project, but our wiz kid (now a maestro) achieved this as a teenager. Fortunately they were able to exhibit this product in the infotel exhibition then, Most of the people were highly fascinated with this innovative product and Harsha & his platoon was started to get orders from many companies & individuals. That was the beginning.
With this demand they couldn’t survive as a fun club any more. They have converted the fun club to a partnership company. There were three people in the company. One marketing guy, a programmer and Harsha. Others were supporting the company after school. They were also involved with part time development work. Team was firering on all the cylinders to deliver the orders they have received from Infotel. Guys who were running in pocket money , are now a well established and branded their inaugural product as “Helawadana” . Now a well known Sinhala word processor in the market. After releasing a few versions of the software these guys had an opportunity to break in to the HR systems. As usual , Microimage team worked hard and developed a world class solution which conquered the Local and international market. Microimage pioneered the web based e-HR systems concept in Sri Lanka. The HR solution introduced by them is strengthen by the input given by the key HR consultants of the country and the expert HR solution providers in Singapore.Training and Development module is developed in line with the ISO process requirements and the performance and rewarding system also supersedes the other competitor systems easily. Ability to use employee self service functions through multiple channels such as web, touch based kiosks and mobile is another example of cutting edge technologies in use. Dialog GSM was the first and most loyal customer of Microimage says Harsha. He resollect the support given by Dialog to grow as a company when they were initially struggling to find a customer for the HR application. I feel it is naturally another tech savvy dynamic company only can identify a good company like this. That may be the reason for Dialog GSM then to hold hands with Microimage. HR Suite developed by Microiamge is now accepted by the corporate sector. Most leading companies in different domains like Telecommnications , Manufacturing , Banking & Finance are now have the privilege of using this hot HR system to make their success in the strategic level.
After being stabilsed in the HR Sector Microimage team wanted a change. A change which can widen their horizon. They got the break that they need again. Harsha & his team are now in to Radio Automation System. This is a very niche market in Sri Lanka. They have turned DJ’s lives upside down. Ealiler the DJ’s not only play songs, they were playing commercials and did a lot of other paper work. All of them were automated by These computer wiz kids. Now DJ’s in most of the Sri Lankan Radio channels should be thankful to Harsha and for his team for making their life easy and fun. This is the first and only radio automation solution to be developed in Sri Lanka today. This has won the Overall Best Product Silver Medal given by National Best Quality Software Awards given by British Computer Society Sri Lankan Chapter. There are many of the cutting edge technologies which is about to be announced to the general public which I would remain silent for the moment. Microimage is now closely working with the ICTA – The Mecca of Sri Lankan Information Communication Technology to provide community Radio broadcasting through “ Nenasala Network”.
Mobile Applications are the next strength of Microimage. They have done wonders in the mobile application arena. Microimage is one of the leading companies that have won the GSM awards. Worlds GSM awards is better known as the mobile Oscars. Handful of companies in the world only had the privilege of at least to be a nominee, but amazingly Microimage already has won the GSM award for Asia Pacific & World Level Commendation. Harsha and his team are the pioneers in developing local language (Sinhala / Tamil / Hindi / Telugu / Dhiveh etc.) applications for mobile phones in emerging markets. Microimage has secured the overall best product Gold in the National Best Quality Software Awards 2005 for this achievement.
They are not restricted only to achieve their business goals. Harsha is so keen on getting his CSR activates also on track. Tsunami disaster was one of the things that triggered a lot of sadness in Harsha’s mind. This has given birth to fully fledged Disaster Warning System. Harsha was highly appreciated in the support he has got from Dr Hans Wijesuriya. Dialog Telkom with Microimage and UoM Dialog Lab spearheaded DEWN project. Again DEWN has won an award in the national best quality software awards in 2006. It’s a hat trick, which is very rare achievement. Well, I can extend this article to any extent. But I was asked to stick to a certain number of words. To conclude, let me make this comment, If am to write a book like GOOGLE STORY or Microsoft Secrets, it will be definitely “THE SUCCESS STORY OF MICROIMAGE”
