Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to the Arvind Ltd Q3 FY '25 Earnings Conference Call. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in the listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during the call, please signal an operator by pressing star, then zero on your touch-tone phone. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Satya Prakash Mishra. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for participating in today's call to discuss the financial results for the third quarter and nine months of the financial year 2024-2025 for Arvind Limited. On behalf of the management team of Arvind Limited, let me wish you all a very prosperous and new year of 2025 ahead. Joining me today is Mr. Punit Lalbhai, the Vice Chairman, Mr. Jayesh Shah, Director on the Board and Group CFO, Mr. Susheel Kaul, our Managing Director and President of Textile Business, and the Chief Financial Officer of Arvind Limited, Mr. Nigam Shah. Punit sir also will introduce you to our new CEO of AMD Business later on. The financial results for the quarter and related presentations were uploaded to our website. Hope you had enough time to go through it.
Over the past nine months of FY 2025, Arvind Limited navigated a complex landscape of challenges and opportunities, ultimately making a significant stride towards our long-term vision of evolving into a premier integrated textile powerhouse. Having fully rebounded from the setbacks encountered in the first two quarters, our growth trajectory is now firmly back on track. In the quarter ended December 2024, the company continued to build on its strong momentum, delivering exceptional performance across its diverse business segments. These results reflect our steadfast commitment to innovation, customer centricity, and sustainability, as well as our ability to navigate an evolving market landscape with agility and focus. We are proud to report a good state of performance marked by double-digit growth in revenue and profitability, reinforcing our position as a trusted leader in the industry.
During the quarter, woven fabric has achieved a remarkable milestone of reaching its highest volume in three years of 35 million m, driven by 100% utilization of capacity, reflecting a 7% year-on-year growth. In denim fabric, despite being a weak season for denim product, it has registered a growth of 19% on a year-on-year basis. As a true testimony of our verticalization strategy, which is visible in improving garmenting volume for the past four quarters in a row, and efforts of the GED team to consistently improve operating efficiency have started showing up financial performance, and we are very excited that the quarters ahead are good, and I'm sure Punit sir will give you his thought process in his remarks in this business. The garmenting division achieved a full garment volume of 9.3 million pieces, which is a growth of 21% on a year-on-year basis.
The current product mix is today skewed towards a higher percentage towards knitted products in the overall basket. We continue to reinforce our people and sources capabilities, along with capacity addition in this business by doing long-term investment to take this business forward. The AMD division posted a growth of 9% in this quarter, which is impacted by change in product mix in key protective clothing segment and realignment of mass transport and industrial segment. Order deferment also has accounted for some of its slower growth. Now, let me give you a summary of financial performance during the quarter. Consolidated revenue and EBITDA for the quarter stood at INR 2,089 crore and INR 237 crore, which is a growth of 11% and 10% respectively. EBITDA margin crossed 11% again and touched 11.3%.
Textile division revenue grew by 11% and stood at INR 1,577 crore, with an EBITDA of INR 177 crore, translating into an EBITDA margin of 11.2%. This is on account of volume growth in our fabric business and better performance in our integrated textile and apparel business. AMD reported a revenue of INR 376 crore, which is a growth of 9%. EBITDA for the same period stood at INR 57 crore and a stable margin of 15%. After a gap of 10 quarters almost, consolidated net profit after tax crossed the INR 100 crore mark and stood at INR 103 crore, which is a growth of 13% on a year-on-year basis. Return on capital employed on a run rate basis improved by 170 basis points to reach 14.6%. The company has spent around INR 350 crore in CapEx, which is as per plan. With this, I conclude my remarks. I now hand over to Mr.
Punit Lalbhai for his remarks.
Good afternoon, everyone. It's a pleasure to interact with all of you. Satya Prakash has covered most things quite accurately. However, I'll just give you one or two sort of headlines from my end. I consider this a decent performance in the difficult environment that we are operating. I think the most heartening thing is how the scale-up of the garments and how the operating efficiencies of the garments are improving. We posted the fourth quarter in a row with about nine million garments, which is set to now take another sort of jump in quarter four and going into next year. So we feel confident and well-poised on that front. I think our woven business on fabric outperformed. I think this has been the best performance of the woven division in its history. So I'm very pleased about that, and we see very good traction in that business going forward.
Finally, coming to AMD, we have, as Satya mentioned, a 9% growth this time. However, our long-term confidence around showing a 20% trajectory is very much intact. All three verticals are doing extremely well. Customer confidence and interest is high. New lines of business are scaling as per plan. The reason for a lower quarter three performance is that there is inventory build-up in a couple of accounts in Human Protection. And therefore, the higher value segments have been deferred to quarter four. And we believe that quarter four should show again growth in the higher teens, in the mid-teens, and then returning back to that 20% trajectory going forward. So when we look at the AMD business, we should look at a few quarters in a row. It's very hard to sort of every quarter hit the exact numbers.
There are some project parts of our business as well, but our confidence for the future is unchanged, and our efforts will be to accelerate growth even further. The opportunity set hasn't changed, and we've only strengthened our team in terms of our ability to deliver. On that note, I would love to introduce all of you to our new CEO for the AMD business. I think it's a very, very important moment in our trajectory. We have done well to reach where we are, but the realization came that if we are to create the next arc of growth and value creation, we will need to create an organization that has a certain set of characteristics.
Those characteristics are building the best culture possible, building systems and processes, doing key account management extremely well, having the highest levels of operating efficiency, and creating a team of high performers that are all rowing in the same direction. And we selected Gurpreet and Gurpreet Bhatia. With that in mind, he comes with international experience. He comes with a track record of building a company from INR 0-INR 4,000 crores. He comes with building one of the most vibrant cultures. He has experience at Shell, at Castrol, and at Livguard. And the last month working with him has been an absolute delight, and I'm very confident that we've chosen the right person to create the next value creation arc. So I'll just ask Gurpreet to say hello, talk a little bit about himself, and then we'll open up the floor for questions.
Good evening, everyone, and Punit Lalbhai, thank you for those kind words and introduction. It's my pleasure and a super delight to be part of this great business, and I'm really looking forward to building on the experience and learnings that I've had over my 30-plus years and really accelerating the learning agenda since I'm new to this business and contributing to the growth of the business and, more importantly, creating and delivering shareholder value as we build this business over the years. My first observation over the last four weeks, every part of the business provides huge growth opportunity, and we have a combination of headwinds and tailwinds. That's the commitment that the management is working on, to put in a more structural, sustained growth engine behind the business, but over the last four weeks, there are opportunities everywhere.
As you rightly said, it takes a period of time to build some of these businesses, and the whole management team and the team at AMD is after delivering that growth engine for a sustained, profitable growth. Thank you for the warm welcome and kind words.
We can now open the floor for questions.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask questions may press star and one on their touch-tone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking questions. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. To ask questions, please press star and one. First question is from Romil Jain from Electrum PMS. Please go ahead.
Good afternoon, sir. Am I audible?
Yes. Good afternoon.
Yeah. Thanks for the opportunity. I just want to understand a little bit more granular detail on the AMD segment, more on the Human Protection. So I think last quarter, there was one customer where some orders were deferred, and there was some slowdown on that. So what is the status currently on that, and how do we see this segment in terms of growth going ahead?
So it's a similar set of customers that are still experiencing a little bit of inventory build-up and slowness in actually the high-value part of the business. So that continues. However, we have not lost a single account, nor have any products unsettled. So that gives me confidence that it's just a temporary sort of blip, maybe four months, maybe six months, before which this will be back. And in parallel, we are also working to build newer accounts with similarly high-value product categories. So some of the larger customers have seen some slowness, but it's nothing to do with our performance. It has more to do with how the market is at the moment, and we shouldn't be overly sort of concerned with that.
What we've also done is that we have sort of started some new segments in the Human Protection division, especially outerwear and sort of the industrial shirts business, which is sort of not specialized fire retardant or anything like that. It is a high-volume driver, and because it is the sort of first introduction of some of these products, they will ramp up in efficiency as we go forward, so they may be lower in value than some of the flame retardant products that we do. They should be quite profitable going forward, so it's a question of adding product lines and some of the high-value established product lines having a little bit of an inventory build-up, and we see this inventory clearing up by the time Q1 rolls around. That's the feedback from most of the customers in that market.
Okay. So out of the overall Human Protection, how much would be the revenues broadly in this high-value segment, which is right now seeing the inventory stocking? And the 15%-20% growth guidance is broadly more in terms of revenue, right? If I'm just to clarify, or is it in volume terms?
No, no, no. In terms of revenue. So I mean, if I will answer that question in another way, if everything had been normal, you would have had INR 30-INR 40 crore of extra revenue across these two quarters. So that's the extent of which the slowness is affecting us. That would have brought us back to that 15%-16% growth levels of AMD as a whole. And that should start recovering in Q4, and we should be back on track in Q1.
Okay. Okay. And in the other two segments, we are not seeing any major competition, maybe from Indian competitors or globally, because there, I think broadly the growth is in line. But if there is anything on that segment as well, we would love to hear your thoughts. And secondly, just one question on the garment side. So I think the volume growth has been strong, but we've seen, I think, some realization pressure, I think, overall. So can you just help us understand how do we see this going ahead? And probably what kind of revenue growth is where we see in the next two years on the garment side?
So revenue growth will cross 20% there quite easily. I think we had some operational challenges in Q1 and Q2 coming out of the strike, etc. But Q3 has been really heartening in terms of turning that around, and Q4 is looking extremely strong as we speak. So I don't see any challenges. I think we are on as per plan on garments. Of course, product mix keeps changing depending on as the new capacities hit. Not all garments I mean, so we have denim versus knits. So because knits has grown faster a little bit, maybe it's looking that way. But I think as all the capacities come on stream in Q4, we should see you should see an improvement there. So we are on plan as far as the garment plan is concerned.
Okay. Lastly, sir, can you run us through the capacity expansion plans next year, and when do they kick in in various segments? That would be all from my side, sir. Thanks.
So if you see, we have already invested in capacity expansion. Our primary mode of capacity expansion has been de-bottlenecking capacities in our existing plants. So trying to make the same labor give more output. And that we feel we would have added this year, we will close at around 40 million garment kind of capacity. Next year, that capacity should grow to around 48-49 million, and we should be able to deliver some 70%-80% of that. So a jump of 8-9 million garments should come next year.
Okay, sir. Thank you so much and good luck.
Thank you very much. Before we take the next question, a request to participants to please limit your questions to two per participant. Should you have a follow-up question, we request you to rejoin the queue. We take the next question from Prerna Jhunjhunwala from Elara Capital. Please go ahead.
Thank you. I just wanted to understand. I mean, most of the questions have been asked by the previous participants. But just wanted to understand this contraction in ASPs in garmenting business. You mentioned knits. But at the same time, volumes could have also gone up because it is low-value items. So I'm trying to understand why the growth would have hit so much, though the volumes continued to be in nine million pieces. Ideally, volumes should have been up in our time.
No, so volume is likely to go up going forward. I mean, it is a question of which customers are being dispatched in which quarter. So that may keep changing a little bit here and there. But overall, I think all our product lines have good profitability. So even the lower ASP will have a similar kind of EBITDA margin. And going forward, this will correct. So we should see a higher top line as before.
Okay. Okay. Understood. And in terms of AMD, sir, you mentioned that 20% growth is doable over a longer period of time frame. But could you help us understand how should we look at growth in the near to medium term in the next one to two years?
No, one to two years, we should also average 20%.
Okay. And the drivers will be the same? Composite, HP, and?
Yeah, yeah. We would like to go deep rather than going wide now. Unless, of course, we get something that is so good that it sort of pushes us to start a fourth vertical, that we will always have as a possibility. But as far as possible, we would like to sort of go deeper rather than broader. Because when you start a new line of business, it always takes longer than you expect. Whereas we already have developed quite sort of interesting scale in these three verticals. Within these three verticals, also, there is huge opportunity. As I've been mentioning on previous calls, there are billion-dollar benchmarks in each of these segments. So there's no reason why we cannot grow. And we have good execution and good customer feedback almost across the board.
So there is no reason why a few quarters in a row we shouldn't be able to grow. The growth will come from, of course, capacity expansion, and we are also evaluating inorganics. So I think over the next couple of years, you will see some inorganics happening. Of course, the inorganics that we will do, we will be conservative. We will be sort of very careful. We don't want to sort of make acquisitions that don't go right. So we'll be very discerning about what we do. But that's definitely also part of the strategy to bolster our growth and to be able to cut down the time frame to achieve scale and leadership in those segments in which we are considering inorganics.
Okay. Sir, a follow-up on this AMD. In the press release, it is mentioned that there was some deferment of orders, which led to a little, which impacted growth in this quarter.
Some of our business is project-based. So it is never possible to define to a T what date that lifting will happen. A lot depends on the customer's site readiness, etc. So sometimes a few days delay means that Q3 revenue goes into Q4. So some of that has happened, but it's nothing very significant. I think the only significant thing is this inventory build-up that is impacting Human Protection business. I think all other businesses are on track.
Okay. Understood. So there can be a bunch of sales in Q4 is what I was coming to by asking this deferment question.
Yeah. I mean, it will keep going up and down. But as I mentioned, we should be in the Q4. Quarter four for us last year was a fantastic quarter. So over that, we see about a mid-teen kind of growth, which would also be good. It would be our highest quarter in history. So I'm not overly worried about one or two quarters of slightly slower growth. We are still very much on the growth path. Opportunities are good and feeling confident.
One more question, if I can squeeze in, on other segments. Others have done well this quarter, and the profits have also increased. So could you highlight whether it is sustainable or?
This is also a project business phenomenon. We have our Arvind Envisol, which is our wastewater treatment business, as part of others. And that had a lot of order completions or project completions in this quarter where revenue was booked. So that is likely to be lumpy. There will be some quarters where it will be high, some quarters where it will be normal. So it's not something that's a trend. It is more a function of the nature of the businesses that are in that group. But overall, those businesses are also doing reasonably well. So long-term trajectory is only up. But quarter to quarter, there can be sort of lumpiness.
Thank you. Before we take the next question, a reminder to participants to please limit your questions to two per participant. The next question is from Surya Narayan Nayak from Sunidhi Securities. Please go ahead.
Yeah.
Sir.
You're not very clear. There's somewhat of an echo.
Okay. Is it okay now?
Yes. Much better.
Okay. So just a couple of questions. One is, in the AMD, we are already running a lag of around, as you said, INR 30-40 crores of revenue, which would have given us around 20% kind of growth. And it is slipping to fourth quarter. So just understanding that there could be some good growth possible in the Q4. So I mean, now that Q4 is more or less crystallized, so just wanted to understand where exactly the Q4, sorry, next year, the benefits of the CapEx will definitely bring results so far as the AMD was concerned. And as you said, the ready-made garment, around 8-9 million pieces will be ordered. So what is the kind of horizon we will be giving? Maybe will it happen in the second half or in the first half?
So generally, our second half is, on an average, better than our first half. That's a sort of business cycle that both our textile and AMD business follows. So from that perspective, what you say is correct. I think the way to think about investment and CapEx is that we are investing enough to hit the 20% growth target. So that's the sort of, that's already factored in. So our objective is to deliver that kind of growth. And as I mentioned, quarter four is looking like mid-teen kind of growth. And next year, we will definitely aim to, on an average, be close to that 20% mark. And we have created all the capacity to allow that to happen, or we are in the process of creating that capacity.
In terms of garments, you will see that gradual ramp-up that will, across the four quarters, add that kind of volume.
Okay, and Punit , because in the end, on the Bangladesh context, it is offering a lot of opportunities and where a lot of unorganized players are present, which cannot get into contact with the global retailers, so in this context, it offers a very good opportunity for acquisition of RMG units in the unorganized sector because RMG is a long-term process of educating or, as it were, giving training to laborers and to have a very good productivity because learning takes time, so in that context, it makes sense. No doubt we are forcing organic growth so of 50% over two years, but at least, it makes sense to go for acquisition, so are you not looking at the inorganic opportunities? If not, then what are the issues we are envisaging?
So I think we are never ruling out inorganic opportunity anywhere. However, I think one thing is very important to understand about RMG. RMG is a very, very management-intensive operation, and the quality of the unit is extraordinarily important. So that is why it is such a difficult business. You can only count the people who are doing well in this segment on the tips of your fingers, especially in the Indian context where there is high attrition and absenteeism every month. We are building a model of garmenting that is very different. We are focusing on high level of automation, reducing the manpower intensity of each process, making it process-dependent rather than people-dependent, and bringing down by using industrial engineering concepts to bring down the time it takes to make a garment. So that's where the value creation is.
It's not simply buying any type of capacity you have and bolting it on. Otherwise, there is a lot of scope to destroying value in garments if garmenting plants are not run well, and that is why also we are very careful about how we scale up, so every point of the way, we are applying these principles, and we want to build a garmenting culture and have our facilities to be absolutely world-class with these principles. In fact, we've built a factory of the future, which has almost 1/3 the manpower intensity. We are experimenting with a lot of new technology to allow garmenting to be more predictable and more scalable, so our way of actually expansion, we want to embed sustainability in it from day one.
So from that perspective, it is very difficult to just acquire something from the decentralized sector and bolt it on because it will not come with these principles. In fact, it will create dissonance in terms of managing that facility because generally, these facilities don't have the kind of systems, processes, talent, automation required to mesh with this philosophy. But any unit that actually can mesh with this philosophy, we will consider for inorganic. So inorganic is never out of the question. Hope that answers it.
Okay. Because our plan of 40-50 million or 60 million pieces was pre-Bangladesh crisis. And post-Bangladesh crisis, I just wanted to know whether any change in the stand has happened in your case, especially through inorganic groups. So that is one. And secondly.
Desirability of India has gone up, but India doesn't have capacity, and we have to add the capacity in the right way, so I think that's the limiting factor, not the market.
Absolutely. Absolutely. So another point is that as we continuously saying that we are getting orders from the knit segment rather than the casual segment rather than formal segment. So just to understand whether the formalization or formal garments will be in demand in next year or what you are figuring? Because so long as the knit garments will be there, then ASP will be definitely on a knit side. So what is your understanding?
So I think formal garments have made a comeback since COVID when they were at rock bottom. So we do have, especially in our fabric business, we cater to dress shirts, and we also manufacture some dress shirt garments. So there is a formal component. But as you rightly mentioned, our specialty is casual, and we make very differentiated casual products. So there is no issue of ASP on our casual garments. So it's more of ASP is more a function of what product mix scaled in which quarter or what customer we introduced in that quarter and the proportion of that customer mix. So that will, across two or three quarters, average itself out, right? So we shouldn't worry too much about that. I think.
Regarding raw material prices, as we have just entered into the first quarter or second quarter of the cotton season, so how do you see the cotton season to pan out? I mean, this year?
So cotton is in a situation that is similar to what it was earlier. We have this sort of artificially inflated price in India because there is a 10% import duty, and the MSPs are reasonably high. And because of that, the Indian cotton is more expensive than global cotton. So it's unfortunately a disadvantage that we have to work hard to overcome. But I think because the buying behavior of customers is also region-specific, it's not hurting us as much. And we have to capitalize on that and make the most of it. So availability is not an issue right now, and price is slightly higher than the overall market. So that's the situation on cotton.
Understood. And AMD, Punit bhai, are we going to get any IPR-related products which will be giving some sort of boost to our steady state of revenue in whatever we are getting in the different verticals?
There are already quite a few IPR-based products. I think most things that we do, we try to add some uniqueness, and we have a set of patents. We have even a larger list of trade secrets where we don't even want to disclose the patents. So there is a good amount of innovation and uniqueness that goes into our product. And that is what has helped us reach the level that we have reached. And we will keep doubling down on innovation. Innovation is a key pillar to our success.
Others generally have emerged as a very good segment. Are we entering in a big way in expanding that segment, or will we keep the presence at the current level only?
What segment? Sorry.
I mean, in the Arvind Envisol, that is the general segments, zero liquid discharge discussed.
Yeah. So there we have two types of business. One is the O&M and parts business, which we will continue to scale aggressively. And the project business, we are being conservative and discerning about the quality of projects we take. So we are not looking at dramatically scaling up the business because in a project business, we don't want to take any risks of execution or of the quality of order or on the customer. We are being discerning about that. So we'll have this medium level of growth there. The opportunity is, of course, there. Water is only going to become a more important commodity going forward. So the momentum is there in the sector. And we will keep our strategy of being conservative and growing at a manageable pace.
Thank you, Suryanarayan. Good luck for the fourth quarter.
Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is from Bhargav from Ambit Asset Management. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Good afternoon, and thank you for the opportunity. So I just wanted to know what is the plan for increasing the garment capacity from a three-year perspective? Is it fair to say that we can sort of reach a capacity of about 70-80 million pieces? And if yes, is there any plans for entering into new geographies like maybe eastern part of the country where there are other garment companies also who are going there?
So I think what we had guided earlier is to try and reach a capacity of 60 million garments by year after next, after two years. So next year, 50, and year after that, 60. So broadly, capacity addition will be there. I think we are four or five months slower in our ramp-up than we envisioned at that point. But that will always happen. There will be parts where we are more cautious based on the global macroeconomic situation. And there will be places where we will press the accelerator. So our plan should broadly follow that trajectory. And we will reassess maybe sometime mid-year what we want to do after another year and a half. So third, fourth, fifth year, we will reassess based on how our trajectory is going. But our guidance is that we would like to have more and more verticalization.
So garment is going to be a long-term story for the group. But as of now, we have the next two years planned out.
So within AMD, there is as a word.
Sorry, I forgot to answer the eastern part of the country. We already have an important hub in the east, which is Ranchi, which is growing very nicely. And this year, it has turned the corner. So we see Ranchi becoming important in our scheme of things. We are also starting Varanasi, which is north, which is also a new area. But that will probably start towards the end of next year, and it will actually play a role year after next.
Okay. Secondly, sir, within AMD, railways as a vertical is a fairly small vertical as of now. But is it fair to say that maybe in the next two to three years, it can see a significant ramp-up? And if you can sort of quantify, what are you looking at maybe in the next two to three years?
So I think it's a very interesting segment. But again, it is a project business where there will be periods of time where there is a burst of orders and then periods of time where there is lack of orders in the market. We are in one of those slow periods. So instead of railways, we are focusing on other product categories that require the similar manufacturing technologies. So we are focusing on electric vehicles. We are focusing on metros. We are focusing on different types of specialized industrial components. So lamination and molding as a process is going to be interesting, and it will be a high-value segment in composites going forward. So I would monitor that rather than just monitoring very specifically railways. We should be broader in assessing the capacity utilization of that facility or that plant.
So if you look at, as of now, exports is around 80% of revenue in AMD. So maybe two to three years hence, you believe that this mix will continue to remain 80%, or you think domestic mix can actually see a ramp-up?
So can you repeat it? I couldn't hear most of your question.
Can you hear me now, sir?
Yeah. Yeah.
So export is about 80% of the current revenue in AMD. Maybe in the next two to three years, you believe that exports will continue to remain 80, or there is a scope for the domestic piece to see a ramp-up?
No, I think domestic is already increasing from that level. I think this year, we are even lower than 70. This quarter, we are even lower than 70. And as defense-type business and domestic rail and those type of businesses come in, it will definitely have. There will be an important domestic component. And in fact, long term, I see domestic being the real pot of gold because we have the highest right to win in India. And the consumption of these product categories will grow faster in India than anywhere else as the economy develops. So for me, India is very important. And even though the volume is lower right now, domestic, we have to spend a disproportionate amount of time and effort in actually incubating and creating the market potential for India. So we look forward to that. I think India is incredibly important.
Margins, sir, in the domestic business will be similar to the export business or lower?
Initially, export margins will be better because those markets are mature, and they demand high-value products. But over a period of time, it should normalize, even in India. And even now, what business we do in domestic doesn't have bad margins.
If we scale this business, is there a possibility that we sort of demerge this business separately so that it gets value?
We've already filed the application petition to the NCLT. So.
Sorry, sir, I could not hear it.
Yeah. So we are currently the company is being put in a separate vehicle, which is 100% of the subsidiary of our parent, Arvind Limited. As of today, as of now, board has considered no such plans to demerge or separately list the company. The capital required for this business, we will see if it requires a larger amount, whether we need to separately fund it through a third-party equity source. But for now, we have enough cash flows within the group to fund this AMD business. So we are not looking at any fundraise for now in that kind of form.
Okay, sir. Thank you very much, and all the very best.
Thank you. Participants are requested to please limit your questions to two per participant. We take the next question from Ashmitha from Electrum Capital. Please go ahead.
Hello. Hello, Arvind?
You are really soft, so I can barely hear you.
Hello, Arvind, right now?
Yeah, much better.
So I have two questions for AMD segment. Just wanted to know the number of clients in each of the three segments in AMD.
I think we can give you that information. I wouldn't know exactly the number of clients on the top of my head, but I can send you that information.
Okay. Also, one question that you mentioned is there's an inventory build-up in the AMD. So when is the peak stocking in this segment expected?
So as I mentioned, by the end of the year, we expect improvement with those set of customers. Meanwhile, other sets of customers are also being developed.
So are we facing any customer concentration in AMD? Going ahead, what will that be?
Sorry, I couldn't.
Is there any customer concentration in AMD going ahead?
Customer concentration is always a relative term. In the advanced materials space, there are going to be fewer and more meaningful customers than say conventional textiles. I would say that I'm pretty happy with the kind of spread of customers we have. We have customers if you just take the Human Protection business. We have customers in the U.S. We have customers now, strong customers developing in the Oceania region. The Middle East is firing up, and of course, we are doing well in India. I would say we have in each area, there are not hundreds of customers, but we are well sort of distributed in terms of our footprint.
My last question would be, are we facing any competition, especially from Indians in the AMD segment? Any Indian competitors?
Yes. I think our success will ensure that there will be competition going forward. But I think we have a good head start of 10 years on anybody who's starting now. So our endeavor will be to always be a few steps ahead and keep sort of increasing our scale, increasing our product complexity and critical nature, and sort of becoming more important to the customers that we already have so that when that competition comes, we are in a different league altogether. So in this business, it takes very long to qualify. And once you qualify, it's not so easy to displace you. So we have that advantage, and we intend to do everything in our power to keep that advantage. That said, of course, competition will come, and we are prepared for it.
Thank you so much for that, Mr. Punit. All the best for you, sir.
Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is from Resham Jain from DSP Asset Managers. Please go ahead.
Hi. Good evening, management. So I have two questions. First one is, if I look at the denim division, we are clocking close to INR 1,200-INR 1,300 crores kind of revenue trajectory. We have downsized our facility, I think, two, three years back. But in the past, we have done, let's say, close to INR 1,900-INR 2,000 crore revenue also. So from the current capacity, what is that peak denim number we can do?
Yes. Susheel bhai, you can answer that question.
In denim division, we are scaling up at the volume. We have been working on the product line to get adopted. The new collection is already in place, and we will see the first impact in Q4. Going forward, that we see definitely a trajectory in denim. So we may not be going to the original INR 2,000 crores level, but yeah, we will be seeing around INR 1,500-INR 1,600 crores back in denim.
Also, I think we are not comparing apples to apples when we look at the past benchmarks. I think we are changing the nature of our denim business by having more and more verticality. So a few more million pieces of garments will come on stream. So it will, again, change the nature, and it should be seen as a vertical business rather than a fabric-alone business. And that verticality is going to increase. So there is future growth in this segment, but it is coming through a different channel than what we had used in the past.
Understood. Clear. The second one is on wovens. So as you mentioned in your initial remarks that you are already running at full utilization, so how are you planning? I think most of the other peers also are actually seeing very good traction on the woven side. So India as a country seems to be gaining quite well. So how are you planning further expansion in woven?
We have done one set of expansion in the woven. We are actually further expanding the product mix in the woven. As you know that, as you said rightly, there are many players who are expanding in woven. And if you work on the similar product segment, you will have a margin pressure. So what we do is we are trying to also diversify the product mix in the woven side, and we are also adding the capacity. So we should see next year 7%-8% addition in the capacity from this year.
I'll also qualify that in a way that woven is so that new capacity should hit us towards the end of this year, financial year. So it will be available for next year. But woven, the platform we are adding in such a way that it also doubles up for AMD. So the type of investment we are doing will also allow us to scale AMD going forward. So woven is the backbone for actually AMD expansion because the base fabrics that then get value added on actually are manufactured in woven. So we are not only expanding woven capacity, but we are also strengthening AMD by the investment that we have done.
Okay. The last one is on the CapEx. You mentioned INR 350 crore CapEx for FY 2025. So if you can just help with the breakup of the CapEx between various divisions. And also, from the cash generation perspective, I could see that you can generate close to INR 500 to INR 600 crores of cash back. So how are you planning your capital allocation for next year?
So similar kind of capital outlay. I think we have enough opportunities. I think the only constraint is our bandwidth to execute well. So opportunities is not a constraint today. And we're maxing out our bandwidth and our free cash flow so that we are at similar levels of debt. We don't want to leverage our balance sheet. But there's enough cash flow available to do everything that we want to grow AMD at 20% and to hit the garment targets that I mentioned earlier on the call, and to do enough differentiation on fabric to remain relevant.
Understood. The breakup of INR 350 crores?
1/3, 1/3, 1/3 broadly, with maybe a little bit higher on garments this year, but maybe AMD will be slightly higher next year.
Okay. Got it. Thank you. All the best.
Thank you. Next question is from Vimal Sampat, who's an individual investor. Please go ahead.
Good evening.
Good evening.
Three questions. One is, please say something more about our PurFi joint venture with them for recycling fabric. And do we have specific customers lined up for that product? What is the CapEx for that, and over what period of time? Second is our rupee depreciation, which has happened over the last three months. How is it going to affect us?
Let me first talk about PurFi. We are a minority investor in this technology. We are investing from the perspective of bringing a new circularity technology to India and then using that fiber to sort of create value for our customers. We are actually sort of like a steward, local steward for this technology. We believe in it. It's a combination of mechanical and chemical recycling, which allows the fiber integrity to remain intact so that we can have a very high proportion of recycled content in the final garment when we use the PurFi fibers coming out of the PurFi process. We're very excited about it. Of course, it's the first time this technology is scaling to a level. And yes, we do have customers lined up.
We can't mention their names for non-disclosure reasons, but it's actually quite in demand, and it was required yesterday from the customer's perspective. So from that perspective, demand is not a concern. I think it's all about execution and ensuring that the value proposition is fully realized for our.
What is the potential for this?
Oh, it can be very large. It can be extremely large.
Like something like AMD and garmenting or maybe going forward?
It's an enabling technology, and we need to do also things downstream for it to become viable. So we will evaluate all those options. Right now, our focus is on getting the first line up and running and producing by the middle of next year. So that's the plan, and we'll take it.
What is the CapEx, sir?
The CapEx is around overall line is about $5-$6 million of CapEx, of which we are only a 10% stakeholder at the moment, so we'll be investing about $1 million currently and having one line and the ancillary infrastructure put in place, and then we will see from there how we will want to take it further.
So it's a long-term story. Yeah.
Yes. It's a long-term story, but it's going to create a lot of excitement and rub-off benefit provided, of course, we have a smooth execution and we are able to produce according to plan. As far as exchange is concerned, we are waiting and watching to see how the macroeconomic landscape shapes up. Our currency has depreciated, but other currencies have depreciated and perhaps slightly more than our currency. So we have to see. But we will, and I think this is going to be a global phenomenon. So we are not overly worried about it, but we are watching the space very closely to see what kind of trade blocs are developing after the new administration in the U.S. takes all its decisions.
Right. And sorry, last one is on that renewable facility, what we were planning. How is it progressing?
We're in. It's progressing well. So we should be towards the end of next year. We should be in a position to sort of kick it off. So the.
Toward end of 2026, FY 2026?
Yeah. End of FY 2026 is when it will come on stream. Yeah.
Okay. So that benefits will kick in from FY 2027 onwards?
Mostly. Yeah.
Right. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question comes from Roshan from B&K Securities. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Thanks a lot for the opportunity. Since now we have our expansion going in the garmenting side, we just wanted to understand how is the labor market as of now? Is there good availability of labor into the markets, or is the constraints happen to be there in terms of labor availability?
So labor is a nuanced subject. There are markets where labor availability is a constraint. There are geographies in which labor availability is not a constraint. I think, however, long-term, we need to understand that the cost of labor is only going to go up, and the availability is only going to get tighter with more and more opportunities that the Indian economy is going to throw up. So we need to develop models that are less labor-intensive. And I think we are putting in a lot of effort and thought and investment behind making our garment businesses less labor-intensive compared to our previous sort of way of working.
Okay. That's helpful. Also, just wanted to understand your view on the outlook for the key export markets. So how are you viewing it this year, the key export markets to perform?
So I think we need to, I'll be able to answer that question much better in the next call once we know what the Trump administration is going to do. But jokes apart, as of now, I think the U.S. has been strong, and Europe has been weak. Also, how the conflicts play out will have a role. So it's a very sort of fluid situation at the moment. If nothing changes, then this is the situation right now. And for us, exports have done well. But we would be wise to wait a few months and see what policy framework is developing before we sort of answer that question to full satisfaction.
Okay. And just a last question from my side. So going forward, the expansion in garmenting maybe, so would you consider taking it up in the northern markets? Because as far as I see, the southern markets kind of remain now saturated, the likes of Tirupur. So what is your view on that? A nd even in terms of labor availability, I guess there are much better availability of labor in the northern markets. So would that, to a certain extent, reduce the absenteeism? So how do you see it?
So I think there are multiple things in managing labor. Broadly, yes, other areas than the south will become important. We already, as I mentioned, Ranchi is important for us. We have a factory in MP, and we might increase our presence there. We have factories in Gujarat. Varanasi will come up. So yes, our footprint is going to diversify. But I think also how we manage labor, the intensity with which the technology that we invest in will make a difference, the HR processes and how we manage and how we manage engagement and sort of taking care of the labor. So I think all of that is built into our new model. And that new model is also equally important as is location. So both things have to be taken into consideration: technology, location, and labor processes. So all of that is baked into our new model.
Okay. Thank you, Anisha.
Thank you.
Than you. Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question for today. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Satya Prakash for closing comments.
Thank you, everyone, once again, for joining the call. I hope most of your questions are answered during the call. Me and my colleague, Himanshu, are just a phone call or an email away for any further questions that you may still have in the future. Looking forward to meeting you in upcoming conferences. Have a good day.
Thank you. On behalf of Arvind Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us. You may now disconnect your lines.