SLT appoints Dr. Mothilal as the new Chairman

Sri Lanka Telecom has appointed Dr. Mothilal de Silva as the new Chairman with effect from 04 November 2024.

SLT also announced the appointment of Chandrasiri Kalupahana, T.M. Thilakarantne, and Niel D.B. Unamboowe, PC as new Independent Non-Executive Directors.

With a career spanning many decades, Mothilal is a result oriented multidisciplinary C-level executive in the telecommunications industry, having experience in Sri Lanka and multiple countries in the Asia and Pacific regions. He is a turnaround specialist and a strategist.

Under his leadership as Group Chief Executive Officer, he turned around Fiji?s State-owned telecommunications company Telecom Fiji Ltd., sustainably after five consecutive loss-making years. During his tenure at Telecom Fiji, the company registered consistent growth in profit, dividend, and investment for network modernisation.

Mothilal was also the Group Chief Strategy Officer and Group Chief Corporate Officer of Dialog Axiata, General Manager ? Sales, Marketing and Customer Service of MTN Networks Ltd., and Vice President ? Process Excellence and Group Operations of Axiata Group Malaysia.

He sat on the Board of Directors of Lanka Communication Services Ltd., a telecommunications service provider for enterprises in Sri Lanka.

As a C-level executive at Dialog, Mothilal set up Corporate Planning, Strategy, MIS, Business Intelligence, Performance Management, Quality, Process Reengineering, Enterprise Program Management and Corporate Development divisions from scratch while apprenticing a young set of managers who had progressed to become leaders in Dialog and the Axiata Group subsidiary companies. He was also instrumental in winning GSMA awards, the International Asia Pacific Quality Award, Asia CSR award for Dialog Axiata, and many national awards.

Mothilal had delivered over 60 presentations in various international forums as a speaker, panellist, session Chairman, and workshop leader, mainly on next generation networks, corporate venture capital for telco, platform economy, business intelligence, sustainability, and business integral CSR.

Mothilal received Bizz NXT Awards 2022 under the category of Top 50 Business Growth Leaders in technology at the BizTalk World Conference, Dubai. He served as a member of the High-level Advisory Council of the World Internet Conference, Wuzhen, China as a nominee of Cyberspace Administration Minister, China, from 2015 to 2017.

Mothilal obtained a Doctor of Business Administration from the PPA Business School, Paris, with a distinction for his dissertation ?Corporate Venture Capital as an Engagement Model for Co-Creating 5G Ready Services.? He has an MSc in IT from Keele University UK, MBA from PIM, SL, BSc (Engineering) SL, Post Graduate Diploma in Strategic Management from Maastricht School of Management, Netherlands, and a Postgraduate Diploma in Marketing Management from PIM SL.? (Colombo Gazette)