Datuk Azzat Kamaludin

Chairman / Non-Executive, Non-Independent Director
Datuk Azzat Kamaludin was appointed to the Board of Dialog Axiata PLC as Chairman and Director on 21 July 2008.

He is an Independent Non-Executive Director of Axiata Group Berhad. Datuk Azzat Kamaludin is a lawyer by profession and is a partner of the law firm of Azzat & Izzat, Malaysia.

Datuk Azzat Kamaludin graduated from the University of Cambridge, United Kingdom, with degrees in Law and in International Law, and was admitted as a Barrister-at-Law of the Middle Temple, London in 1970. Prior to being admitted as an advocate and solicitor of the High Court of Malaya in 1979, he served as an administrative and diplomatic officer with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Malaysia from 1970 to 1979.

Datuk Azzat Kamaludin is presently a director of several public listed and private limited companies in Malaysia. He has also served as a member of the Securities Commission, Malaysia from 1993 to 1999.

Dr. Shridhir Sariputta Hansa Wijayasuriya

Group Chief Executive / Non-Independent, Executive Director
Dr. Hans Wijayasuriya was appointed to the Board of Dialog Axiata PLC on 19 January 2001.

Dr. Wijayasuriya joined the Company in 1994 as a member of the founding management team of the Company, and has functioned in the capacity of the Chief Executive of Dialog Axiata, since 1997. He counts over 17 years experience in technology related business management. He also serves on the boards of a number of international subsidiaries of the Axiata Group.

A Fellow of the Institute of Engineering Technology of the UK (IET), Dr. Wijayasuriya is a Chartered Professional Engineer and also a member of the Institution of Electrical and Electronic Engineers (IEEE), USA. Dr. Wijayasuriya graduated with a degree in Electrical and Electronic Engineering from the University of Cambridge, UK in 1989. He subsequently read for and was awarded a PhD in Digital Mobile Communications at the University of Bristol, UK. Dr. Wijayasuriya also holds a Masters in Business Administration from the University of Warwick, UK.

Dr. Wijayasuriya is a past Chairman of GSM Asia Pacific – the regional interest group of the GSM Association representing 49 Asia Pacific member countries, and has earned the distinction of being included in the GSM 100 Role of Honour for his contribution to GSM in the Asia Pacific Region.

Dr. Wijayasuriya was a recipient of the CIMA-Janashakthi Business Leader of the Year award in its inaugural year of presentation in 2003, and of the coveted ‘Sri Lankan of the Year’ award in 2008 presented by Sri Lanka’s premier business journal the LMD.

Dato’ Sri Jamaludin Ibrahim

Non-Independent/ Non-Executive Director
Dato’ Sri Jamaludin was appointed to the Board of Dialog Axiata PLC on 23 March 2011.

Dato’ Sri Jamaludin has worked for about 30 years in the ICT industry – 16 years in IT industry and 14 years in telecommunications industry. He is currently the President and Group Chief Executive Officer of Axiata Group Berhad, which he joined in March 2008. He is also a board member of Axiata Group.

Prior to that, Dato’ Sri Jamaludin was with Maxis Communications Berhad (Malaysia), which he joined in 1997 and was appointed Chief Executive Officer in 1998. In 2006, he was redesignated the Group Chief Executive Officer to reflect Maxis’ international footprint. He retired from Maxis in July 2007 and continued to be non-executive Director until February 2008.

Before joining Maxis, he spent 16 years in the IT Industry. He was Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of Digital Equipment Malaysia (the Malaysian branch of Digital Equipment, then the second largest IT company worldwide) from 1993 to 1997. Dato’ Sri Jamaludin also spent 12 years in IBM (1981-1993), the first five years as Systems Engineer and then in various positions in Sales, Marketing and Management. Prior to IBM, he was a lecturer in Quantitative Methods at California State University, United States in 1980.

Dato’ Sri Jamaludin graduated from California State University in 1978 with a B.Sc. in Business Administration and minor in Mathematics. He obtained his MBA from Portland State University, Oregon in 1980.

Dato’ Sri Jamaludin is also the Chairman of Celcom Axiata Berhad (Malaysia), and sits on the boards of PT XL Axiata Tbk.(Indonesia), M1 Limited (Singapore) and Multimedia Development Corporation Sdn Bhd (MDeC). Dato’ Sri Jamaludin is also board member of the GSMA (the global World GSM Association).

Dato’ Sri Jamaludin earned the accolade of Malaysia’s ‘CEO of the Year’ 2000 by American Express & Business Times and was inducted into the Hall of Fame for ‘Services to the Mobile Telecommunications Industry’ by Asian Mobile News in 2004. He was also named ‘Asian Mobile Operator CEO of the Year’ by Asian Mobile News Awards 2007 and ‘Telecom CEO of the Year’ by Telecom Asia Awards 2010 and Frost & Sullivan 2010 Asia Pacific ICT Award.

Mr. Azwan Khan Osman Khan

Non-Executive, Non-Independent Director
Mr. Azwan Khan was appointed to the Board of Dialog Axiata PLC on 21 July 2008.

He is the Group Chief Strategy Officer of Axiata Group Berhad. His current responsibilities include Group Corporate Strategy, Group Marketing and Product Development, Group Synergies, Strategic Initiatives, Branding and Corporate Communications. He was formerly the Senior Vice President, Corporate Strategy and Development in Celcom (Malaysia) Bhd (“Celcom”), a position he held since mid-2005.

Mr. Azwan Khan is an engineering graduate (First-Class Honours) from the Imperial College, University of London, with a broad mix of telecommunications and non-telecommunications experience across a range of companies. His professional experience also included an extensive time with The Boston Consulting Group and Shell Malaysia.

Mr. Azwan Khan is also an active board member in Sacofa Sdn Bhd and Samart I-Mobile Public Limited Company He is also a member of the GSMA Chief Strategy Officer Group.

Mr. James Maclaurin

Non-Executive, Non-Independent Director
Mr. James Maclaurin was appointed to the Board of Dialog Axiata PLC on 10 May 2011.

He is the Group Chief Financial Officer of Axiata Group Berhad. James has been in Finance leadership positions in various companies for the last 18 years. Given below are the highlights of James’ career in finance, where he has specialised in the telecommunication industry and has worked extensively in various developing markets:

• Vodafone plc where James served as the CFO for Africa and Central Europe, one of 3 regions generating revenues of more than $11billion. In this capacity James served on the board of Vodacom Group in South Africa where he successfully guided the company through an IPO process on the Johannesburg Stock Exchange and James was also a board member of Safaricom, East Africa’s largest mobile operator which was listed on the Nairobi Stock Exchange.
• Celltel, the 2nd largest pan-African mobile operator operating in 14 sub-Saharan countries where James served as its CFO.
• the telecoms vendor Marconi plc for which James served as its Executive Vice President Finance as well as the COO of Marconi Finance plc – the banking arm of Marconi and various other roles. As EVP Finance James held a key role in the successful 2002 £5.4bn debt restructuring of Marconi during the 2001/2 technology recession.
• the General Electric Company for which he served as Finance Director of local operations in Singapore, Hong Kong, Brunei, Vietnam and Bangladesh.
• UbiNetics, a venture backed company which was based in Cambridge in the UK specializing in the development of 3G protocol stacks and network test measurements systems – James was its CFO and in this capacity successfully led the sale of the company to Aeroflex of the US and Cambridge Silicon Radio, (CSR plc) in the UK.
• His last job was with Helios Towers Africa, a London based private equity backed African focused tower operator specializing in sale and leaseback of passive mobile infrastructure where 3 successful sale and leasebacks of passive networks in Tanzania, Ghana and DRC were executed.

James initially graduated in civil engineering from the University of Dundee in Scotland, but went on to take on postgraduate finance qualifications and qualified as a member of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Scotland in 1992 having trained for 3 years at Grant Thornton in Edinburgh.

Mr. Moksevi Rasingh Prelis

Independent Non – Executive Director
Mr. Prelis was appointed to the Board of Dialog Axiata PLC on 15 September 2004.

He has 27 years experience in the banking sector out of which 21 years was in the capacity of CEO/Director of the DFCC Bank and the Nations Trust Bank. Prior to this he has worked for 16 years as an Engineer and a Manager in the automobile manufacturing and steel industries. He has held the posts of Chairman – Ceylon Electricity Board, Chairman – National Institute of Business Management, Chairman – Association of Development Finance Institutions of Asia & Pacific, headquartered in Manila and Chairman – St. Johns National Association of Sri Lanka. He has served as a Director on the boards of 20 companies and five state institutions. He is currently the Chairman of the Capital Trust Securities Group and Asia Commerce Holdings (PVT) Ltd and a Director of the Colombo Stock Exchange Ltd and Sinwa Holdings Ltd.

He holds a Bachelors degree with Honours in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Ceylon, and a Masters degree in Industrial Engineering and Management from Purdue University USA, a Postgraduate Certificate in Industrial Administration from Aston University Birmingham and has completed the International Senior Management Programme of the Harvard Business School, USA. He is a Chartered Engineer of UK, a Fellow of the Institution of Engineers Sri Lanka, a (Hon) Member of the Institute of Personnel Management and a (Hon) Fellow of the Institute of Bankers Sri Lanka.

Mr. Mohamed Vazir Muhsin

Independent, Non – Executive Director
Mr. Muhsin was appointed to the Board of Dialog Axiata PLC on 14 June 2006.

Mr. Muhsin’s experience includes working as a Strategic Management Consultant and Director on international corporate and foundation Boards. Prior to his retirement as the Vice President & Chief Information Officer at the World Bank, Mr. Muhsin was responsible for aligning information technology with the organisation’s business strategy. He successfully implemented major reforms in global telecommunications, video conferencing, information management and enterprise business systems.

A Chartered Accountant and a Fellow of the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Sri Lanka, Mr. Muhsin also worked in senior positions in the private sector in Sri Lanka and served for several years as an advisor to the then President of Zambia, Dr. Kenneth Kaunda on state enterprise reform and as the Group Financial Director of Zambia’s Mining and Industrial conglomerate.

Mr. Jayantha Cudah Bandara Dhanapala

Independent, Non – Executive Director
Mr. Dhanapala was appointed to the Board of Dialog Axiata PLC on 3 August 2007.

He was a career diplomat in the Sri Lanka Foreign Service and the United Nations (UN). He was the Ambassador of Sri Lanka and the Permanent Representative to the UN in Geneva (1984-87), the Ambassador of Sri Lanka to the USA (1995-97) and UN Under-Secretary-General (1998-2003). He is the current President of the 1995 Nobel Peace Prize-winning Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, and sits on advisory boards of other international institutes. Mr. Dhanapala served as a member of the UN University Council for a period of seven years, and sits on the Governing Board of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute and advisory boards of other international institutes. Mr. Dhanapala was named ‘Sri Lankan of the Year 2006′ by Sri Lanka’s premier business magazine, the Lanka Monthly Digest (LMD). He has also received many international awards.

Mr. Dhanapala was awarded a Bachelor of Arts (Honours) degree majoring in English Literature with French from the University of Peradeniya Sri Lanka and a Master of Arts degree in International Studies from the American University in Washington DC. He was awarded honorary doctorates by the Universities of Peradeniya and Sabaragamuwa, Sri Lanka, the Monterey Institute of International Studies in the USA, the University of Southampton UK and the Dubna International University in the Russian Federation. He has published several books and written articles for international journals.