Ceylon Biscuits Limited (branded CBL, commonly called Munchee) is a Sri Lankan food manufacturer, the maker of Munchee biscuits and one of the oldest biscuit makers in Sri Lanka. The company owns 60% of the domestic market share in Sri Lanka.[2][3]
History
In the 1930s Simon Arthur Wickramasingha (1902-1961) acquired a small factory that produced handmade biscuits from a local businessman called Williams. In 1939 the company Williams Confectionery Limited was formally established in Dehiwela with ten employees. In 1957 the factory was upgraded and mechanised, with Baker Perkins manufacturing lines imported from the UK. Wickramasingha's four sons, N. P. (Pali), R. L. (Ranjith), M. P. (Mineka), and R. S. (Ramya), took over the business when their father died in 1961.[4]
In the 1960s the Ministry of Education, with the assistance of the US based organisation CARE, provided school children with a cup of milk and a bun as nutritional supplements to their midday meal. However, due to the inability to maintain the quality of the bun, CARE began assessing alternatives, eventually settling on biscuits. Mineka Wickramasingha successfully obtained the contract.