The BOI granted investment approval to Statesman Hats (Private) Limited for a project to manufacture hats, caps, headwear and head dresses for export. Mr. Dhammika Perera, Chairman / Director General signed the agreement and formally presented the BOI Certificate of Registrations to the investors.
The company will establish the production facility in Wattala and is expected to export their products to markets in Europe, United States, Australia, New Zealand and Japan.
Over the next two years Mount castle Australia will be transferring the skills and the expertise developed in 165 years of hat making to Statesman Hats staff in Sri Lanka. Mr. James Baldwin, Managing Director of Mount Castle (Pty) Limited, Australia stated “Our goal is to make Statesman Hats a world leader in the manufacture of quality headwear”.
Statesman Hats will manufacture products of a world’s best quality standard such as Peaked Military Caps, Police Headwear, Casual Lifestyle Headwear and Academic Regalia for clients such as Polo, Helen Kaminski and Gieves & Hawkes.
Among the products are high quality hats made out of raffia. These are sold at exclusive boutiques overseas under designer labels.
He said “The Company believes that Sri Lanka has its best competitive advantage against other manufacturing based economies in its people’s ability to understand quality and to be successfully trained to achieve these standards”.
“The ventures success will depend on how successfully we achieve consistent quality. It is the way that our enterprise will maintain its markets and profitability going forward” he further stated. The company believes that the Sri Lankan enterprise is in a position to provide products and customer service to its markets that it will give them the competitive edge. Their products will be the highest quality products available in the market and therefore will be of the best value for money.Mr. Baldwin along with Mr. Taher Jafferjee thanked the BOI for providing them with the opportunity of becoming a part of the BOI community.
(courtesy:BOI)