First Lankan assembled 4G smartphone to market in December | Daily News

First Lankan assembled 4G smartphone to market in December

IJV with Lodule International of South Korea inked for Rs 900 mn project
Sri Lankan Ambassador in Korea Saj Mendis with the topmost management of Lodule International.
Sri Lankan Ambassador in Korea Saj Mendis with the topmost management of Lodule International.

Creating history in the Sri Lankan ICT sector, the island’s first assembled 4G enabled mobile smartphone, would be released to the market by Micro Electric International Pvt. Ltd Colombo by December 2021. It has been branded Hypro 4G.

Chairman Micro Electric Dhammika Samarawickrama said that they had already signed the IJV agreement with Lodule International Ltd of South Korea and the phone model and other design details are finalized.

The HyPro mobile will have an English, Sinhala and Tamil languages selection option while the user will also have the option of selecting Buddhist, Christian, Hindu, and Muslim religious sermons. “We will also obtain a patent for this.”

“The Sri Lankan Embassy in Korea, particularly Ambassador, Saj Mendis has had several rounds of discussions to restore confidence and optimism on the topmost management of Lodule International Ltd. to continue and take forward this project.”

Micro Electric International is an ISO certified family-owned electrical products and Accessories Company, completing 25 years. They have over 350 well-trained employees (with outsourcing) and supply their products globally and domestically. The Company has a dealer network of 2,745 and 40 distributors selling over 40 products ranging from plugs, holders, fuse boxes and other electrical accessories.

The total joint investment would be around Rs. 900 million. The Made in Lanka Hypro 4G smartphone news was EXCLUSIVELY reported in ‘Daily News Business’ in May and after this several banks had offered them credit facilities while large distributors wanted to market them.

He said that they hope to price the phone for under Rs. 26,000 and for the first time, the mobile will be sold via their dealer network thus passing the large commissions offered to usual distribution channels to customers.

Chairman, Samarawickrama said that they have already signed a JV with Lodule Co. Ltd Korea, one of the leading suppliers of mobile and TV component manufacturing companies in Korea and they have already set up mobile manufacturing plants in several countries. Since 2015 Lodule Korea has been supplying electrical components, LCD screens, mobile accessories to all major TV and smartphone brands in the world; they also opened their Chinese factory in 2016. “This is the model they want to adopt to Sri Lanka as well and are looking at exporting 60% of Hypro 4G phones with the ‘Made in Sri Lanka’ tag overseas and will also look at manufacturing other electrical components.”

He said that due to the pandemic and limited international travel restrictions they now hope to import mobile accessories and will start assembly next month. After four months, Korea’s Lodule Company Mobile engineers will be stationed in Sri Lanka and will import machinery and commence manifesting locally.”

He said that the Industries Minister Wimal Weerawansa was also keen that this product should commence and mature towards an export-oriented venture and personally stepped in to iron out some red tape.

Samarawickrama also recalled and thanked the Chief incumbent of Sri Lankaramaya in Korea, Ven Katuwana Vijithawansa Thera for introducing the senior management of Lodule Co. Ltd Korea. Most of the negotiations were done on Zoom.


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