Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to Q4 FY25 Conference Call of GMM Pfaudler Limited. 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 conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star, then zero on your touch-tone phone. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Dhaval Rajput. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Thank you, Keith. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. A very warm welcome to all of you to the Q4 FY25 Earnings Call of GMM Pfaudler Limited. The earnings presentation was uploaded on the stock exchanges today and is also available on our website. Hope all of you had a chance to go through it. From the management, we have with us our Managing Director, Mr. Tarak Patel, our CEO of International Business, Mr. Thomas Kehl, our CEO of India Business, Mr. Aseem Joshi, our CFO, Mr. Alexander Poempner, and our Compliance Officer, Ms. Mittal Mehta. We will give you a brief overview of the performance of the company, after which we get into the Q&A.
Before we begin with the overview, a brief disclaimer: the presentation that was uploaded on the stock exchanges and also on our website, including our call discussions that will happen now, contain or may have certain forward-looking statements regarding our business prospects and profitability, which are subject to several risks and uncertainties. The actual results could materially differ from those in said forward-looking statements. I would now hand over the call to Mr. Tarak Patel to provide an overview of the performance. Over to you, Tarak.
Thank you, Dhaval. Good evening, everyone, and thank you for joining us today. As we conclude the financial year, I'm pleased to share our performance highlights. For FY25, GMM Pfaudler achieved consolidated revenues of INR 3,199 crore and EBITDA of INR 381 crore, which is an 11.9% EBITDA margin. Our order intake for FY25 was INR 3,102 crore, up 3% from previous year. Our current balance loss on April 1, 2025, stands at INR 1,636 crore. We also generated strong cash flows of INR 318 crore in FY25, an improvement of nearly INR 100 crore over the previous year. In Q4 FY25, our revenues stood at INR 807 crore, with an EBITDA of INR 93 crore at an 11.5% margin, with a 9% growth in revenue and a 4% growth in EBITDA margin on a year-on-year basis. Order intake for the quarter stood at INR 660 crore.
Our India business has a strong performance in Q4, with revenues of INR 252 crore and EBITDA of INR 44 crore, with an EBITDA margin of 17.4%. The India business has also seen significant improvements in H2 FY2025 due to an increase in volume, favorable productivity, and an ongoing EBITDA transformation program, the benefits of which will continue into FY2026. All costs for this program have been taken in this financial year. Our India backlog stands at INR 549 crore, which is higher by 20% on a year-on-year basis. Our global manufacturing footprint optimization continues. Our U.K. facility in Leavon is on track for closure in Q2 FY2026. As you will see in this quarter, all costs accounted for this closure have already been taken in this financial year.
We also shut down our Hyderabad facility this year, and the costs of this closure were taken in Q2 of this financial year as well. The production from this facility has now moved to our facility in Gujarat. Our low-cost manufacturing site in Poland has been established, and we now plan to shift production and increase production at that site as well. I would also like to welcome Gregory Gelhaus as Chief Transformation Officer. As CTO, Greg will lead the group's transformation efforts and key strategic initiatives to drive business expansion, improve operational efficiencies, and enhance collaborative and integration among the geographies and our locations. Looking ahead, we are optimistic. However, the India business continues to do quite well, and we are in a strong position to deliver growth in both revenues and margins. Our international business has a good starting backlog.
However, the current situation with U.S. tariffs, also the uncertainty surrounding investment, that may have some impact on our international business. In conclusion, I think this year has been a transition year for us. I think we are focused on improvement programs internally. As I mentioned, two sites have been shut down. We've run a transformation program here in India, and as the market seems to be turning a little bit, we hope that some of the new kind of volume will help us also achieve some of the improvements for the next financial year. With that, I would like to hand over the call to Alex, our CFO, who will take you more through the balance sheet and some of the other financials. We will then also open this to questions as well. Thank you very much. Over to you, Alex.
Thanks, Thomas. Good evening, everyone, also from my side. As I do not want to say too much about the profit and loss, just to reiterate or say again that we have considered all the one-time impacts due to the closure of Hyderabad as well as Leavon already in this financial year. We consider that we have done the homework to see the positive benefits in the next financial year. With regard to the balance sheet, the balance sheet, we show a strong improvement. We have a really solid, good balance sheet, especially from the cash flow side. You see that the working capital and free cash flow generations have improved significantly in the fiscal year 2025 as compared to the previous year.
We have retained long-term debt of around INR 116 crore, resulting in an improved net debt to EBITDA matrix of 0.5 times versus 0.8 times in the last financial year. The net debt to equity also improved to 0.2 times versus 0.4 times last year. As mentioned, this is especially driven by a good working capital improvement. Therefore, on the cash flow front, we have generated a free cash flow of around INR 318 crore during the year as compared to around INR 221 crore in the previous year. This results in an 80% conversion of the reported EBITDA of INR 381 crore. This is again an improvement over the previous year that the free cash flow to EBITDA ratio was around 50%. This is so far everything from my side, and I would like to hand over to Dhaval again.
Thank you, Alex. Do you have any other upper line for questions?
Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question 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 handset while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, you can wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Jaiveer Shekhawat from Ambit Capital. Please go ahead.
Sure, thanks for taking my question. My first question is on the India business. It's encouraging to see the adjusted EBITDA margin trajectory there.
Hello? Hello?
Yes, sir, the current participant has been disconnected. We will go to the next question.
Yeah, maybe they will come back and just make sure that he comes back into the list, please. Yeah.
Yes, sir.
Okay.
The next question is from the line of Kiran Kumar from Acquity Capital Advisors. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hello. Thanks for taking my question. I had a question on the international business. In particular, I was trying to compare the order intake in the international business in FY 2025, and I was comparing it to the previous three years, right? While doing that, I noticed that the order intake for FY 2025 in the international business was almost not very different from what it was back in FY 2022, right? It is almost at the same level even after three years have passed, number one, right? Within that, if I further look at the services part of the order intake, there is a drastic decrease in the services order intake in FY 2025 when I compare it to the FY 2022 level, right?
I wanted to get an understanding of this that, A, at an overall level for the international business, the order intake being stagnant on a three-year basis, right? I wanted to understand the causes for that and how do we see this going forward. Also, in particular, I wanted to understand the services order intake of the international business, the fall compared to the levels of FY 2022, and again, how do we see that going forward? Thank you.
I think 2022 obviously was the time after COVID where things were booming. Our focus to grow service revenue continues. This year, the service order intake has probably been below our expectations, but currently, in terms of the pipeline and the focus in terms of growing our services business, is on track. We do feel at some point, and especially last year, because of the slowdown, general slowdown in the industry, both capital equipment in terms of new CapEx as well as services across our client base did reduce. We now have some kind of hope that maybe in the coming years, these services revenues will increase. The idea is to continue to be close to the customers and make sure that we don't lose service business, and that's something that across all our locations, we are trying to obviously grow.
The services business especially was lower in the U.S., but we do expect some recovery to come at some point. In India, we have also seen a slight slowdown in services, which is a general trend now across the world. However, for that service, it's a very important portion of our overall order intake, and it continues to be a focus area for us to come back to the level that we had in 2022. Thomas, if you would like to add or Aseem as well.
I think what you said is right, that the overall market has slowed down after 2022 and the makeup time after the pandemic. That is true also for the service job. Some of the bigger service jobs were a little on hold by customers looking at the current situation and its development, but those jobs are not going away. They are delayed. They will come to us later.
Hello.
Yes, go ahead.
Yeah, just to understand, I mean, to improve my understanding of the services part of the business, our perception was that that is linked to the base of the insured base of the clients, right? One reason for drastic reduction compared to three years ago could be that is it that a lot of those insured base, there have been significant shutdowns in particular geographies it has impacted. Otherwise, one would expect that if those facilities are running, they would continue to require your services, right? There should be some service inflation in terms of the order intake and revenues, right? That is the aspect I wanted to understand better.
No, I think by that logic, our India insured base is probably the highest in the world, and we still have 78% of service revenue. I think it's just the mindset and the uncertainty surrounding the current situation has that kind of driven some of these decisions. Maybe at a budget level for spare parts as well within companies, maybe that is something that companies have kind of tried to cut back on. At some point in time, when these equipment need to produce, you will have the service revenue picking up. Right now, we haven't seen any major shutdowns in the U.S. or Europe. I think it's just kind of a trend where people did not want to spend money on services if they did not have to. At some point, these equipment, like you said, are old equipment.
They've been installed for quite a period of time. The services at some point should come back, and we expect it to come back in the next financial year as well.
Understood. The assumption is also that since you have spread your service base further in terms of geographies during this time, that should also probably help you in terms of getting these revenues again?
Yes, correct. I think services, again, is a key focus area for us. By the last couple of years, we've kind of created a smaller workshop and service centers across the globe just to better serve our customers. We have three or four service centers now here in India. We've created like two or three service centers in the U.S., a few in Europe as well. Services, this is definitely a push. At some point, it will come back. We went through a lean period both in terms of CapEx for new equipment as well as service. We thought that during a cycle, a down cycle where CapEx slows down, the services would increase. However, that was not the case.
I think as some of these CapExes are coming back as well and some of the margins and volumes are increasing at our client sites, we will see now some of these services also coming back.
Thank you. That was very helpful.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Jaiveer Shekhawat from Ambit Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi, thanks. I'm sorry I got dropped off earlier. My first question was on your EBITDA margin trajectory for your standalone business. Apart from these one-off costs in relation to transformation, what further benefit do you expect? I mean, after the exercise is already done on your margins, that'll be my first question.
Yeah, I think the India transformation program, which has run now for the nine months of the last previous year, has given us improvement both in terms of our cost structure, but also in terms of operational excellence and areas in which we had not probably paid attention to. That has put us in a very strong position at least here in India at our factory here in Gujarat. What has also happened in India is the closure of Hyderabad. Having that facility no longer available, the load of Hyderabad has now moved into Gujarat, which now obviously has much better utilization as well. We are now in a position where we will now even think of starting a third shift to address the volume. We have a large last line backlog as well. I think India margins will continue in this range as well.
15% should be achievable for next financial year. Maybe Aseem can jump in now to talk a little bit more specifics about this transformation program and the other cost controls that we have worked on here in India.
Sure. While Tarak talked about the cost controls, I'll cover a few other elements that were part of this program, and that should help us not just in FY 2022 but beyond. We're very focused on our capacity improvement. Obviously, when you slow down a factory and you need to consolidate that, you have to be able to absorb the capacity especially when the demand comes back. We're very confident we're in a position to do that in our current perspective now. We've also enhanced the flexibility of our factory in that as we have additional product lines that are made in current, we have the ability to flex as demand varies. We've seen we're in a lot better position now, not just probably from a factory, sorry, from a financial and margin standpoint, but also from a flexibility standpoint. Those benefits will persist for incoming years.
Yeah, and maybe just to add in terms of outlook, we feel that there is more positivity today. The customers that we speak to in India have shown a lot more interest of investing now. Volumes have come back. Margins might still be under pressure, but as the first obvious sign is these volumes are coming back, right? We see that in terms of even the opportunity pipeline here in India has improved significantly. We also believe that some of the agrochemical players will start investing in maybe August, September time frames as well. All in all, we have a positive view on India starting this year already with a much bigger backlog than previous year. Plus, the first month, especially April, has been very strong in terms of order intake as well. We are in a strong position in India for the financial year.
Internationally as well, we've had a pretty good April in terms of order intake. We need more orders as well, which we are working on. Generally, we are today in a much better position than we were 12 months ago, right? The hard work, like Aseem and Alexander mentioned, has already gone in. We are in the down cycle, and hopefully, as volumes pick up and the market improves, we will be able to extract as much as possible from this increased volume as well, right? That is the overall picture here for India.
That's very helpful. I think the other question also was in relation to this. What we have seen is your competitor has been able to recover back to their FY 2023 revenues from the GLE division in FY 2025. What's your estimate both for your standalone business and the international business as to when they reach back to your peak level revenues, which you might have also done in FY 2023 on the GLE side specifically?
On the GLE side, I think we are now at pretty much similar levels as previous, just slightly lower than that. Obviously, if we see our quarterly performance, it has been pretty stable. We like to kind of make sure that, obviously, even going forward, we have stable quarters and we plan and we perform as per expectation. Obviously, the volume this quarter, even if you see the total revenue, it's still not a significant improvement over previous quarter or even previous year. In spite of the incremental volume not being there, we were still able to increase margin significantly.
Do keep in mind with the volumes increase over the next two quarters, you will definitely see even better kind of flow through because at the same revenue levels, we are still now at a 500 basis points improvement here in India if you compare that to Q4 of the previous year, right? Which is a positive for us. As volumes increase and it will increase, you will clearly see some better flow through as well.
Sure. My last question is just on the order intake. While I understand that you have healthy backlog for the India business, I mean, is it by choice that you are limiting the order intake there? Also, in the international business, I think we have not really seen order inflows there. Ideally, every quarter, it's sort of reducing. When do you think that should bottom out in your expectation, I think both India and the international business?
I think on the order intake front, India, like I said, strong backlog, 20% higher. April has been a good month. I think for the international business, also April has been a very strong month. That will reflect in obviously our backlog at the end of Q1. I think we will be in a better position to talk a little bit more about that when those orders are, some of them are already in and some more expected. We are quite confident that we will be in a much stronger position at the end of Q1.
Perfect. Thank you so much and all the best.
Thank you.
The next question is from the line of Sagar Shah from Spark PWL. Please go ahead.
Good evening, everyone. Congrats to the entire team for posting some decent set of numbers. My first question was related to our global business, especially related to glass lining and some non-glass lining technologies. What we had pursued at the start of the year obviously things did not turn out because of the macroeconomic factors which are not in our hands. Specifically speaking on the industrial mixing and especially on the glass lining side, globally looking at the order intake that the company is actually getting, the order intake is actually reducing, almost has reduced as compared to even the last year. Is there something like are we losing some market share specifically on the glass lining and the non-glass lining technologies? Maybe specifically, can you highlight what exactly is going on outside?
Sure. I'll start with Thomas.
You know, as we all know that the market situations are not perfect and not as it has been a few years ago. We know all the uncertainties of the industry and that shows in the order intake. We have a lot of projects and the pipeline is still robust and big, but the decision-making processes are slow and hesitated. Therefore, we are 100% sure that we are not losing market share. The projects that are on hold will come sooner or later. It started a little bit already in April. April is a better month. We are very confident that the first quarter will show us an increased network and order intake again.
Ok ay. Thanks, Sir.
I think we'll see. I have one comment here.
I think over the past few years, I think there were a few units that we've been working on. Because of the large backlog and the large order intake that they had, they had this struggle to also ship out some of these equipment. Some of that restructuring has also happened this year. These units are now much better placed in terms of receiving new orders and also shipping out these orders as well, right? There is a bit of capacity available. We are aggressive when it comes to delivery and pricing. Hopefully in the next couple of months, including, I mean, what we booked in April already, plus the next two months, we should be in a much stronger position by the end of Q1 as a company in terms of both order intake and backlog as well.
Got your point, sir. My second question was related to the Poland acquisition, actually. We are closing the U.K. operations as well as the Hyderabad operations in India and starting with the new acquisition at Poland. Can you highlight about the cost benefits that are likely to accrue by manufacturing there? Specifically, can you highlight about how the cost structure is different as compared to manufacturing in the U.K. versus manufacturing in Poland versus India?
Okay. There is a slight misunderstanding here. U.K. was a glass-lined facility and Poland is not a glass-lined facility. Poland is really a facility that will support our non-glass-lined business. It supports our Swiss entity, Mavak, and it supports our EC business, so Mixsel in France. Both Mixsel and Mavak are in a higher cost Western European region while Poland is in Eastern Europe and much cheaper for both engineering as well as manufacturing. Poland is a joint venture. We have already completed the first order from Mavak, our Swiss subsidiary. There were absolutely no quality issues, and that equipment was supplied on time at a much lower cost structure than if we had to manufacture that in Switzerland as well. In terms of the new orders going into Poland, there is a large order that Mixsel won recently.
That entire order will be made in Poland and not in France. If you had to ask me, you would see a 20%+ cost benefit between Western Europe and Poland. That is something that we could expect, that between India, Poland, and the other value sourcing sites that we have, we will find the right kind of situation to make sure that the customer gets the right product at the right price point, and we will improve our margin because of this low-cost structure that is available in the region.
Okay. Thanks, sir. I had just a data keeping question. Within technologies, can you highlight that how much was glass lining the revenue, the non-glass lining revenue, and the rest is industrial mixing? Can you highlight the consequence between these three amongst the technology revenues?
Are you talking on a global basis or on an India basis?
Yeah, on a consolidated basis, sir.
I don't think I have the data in front of me, but generally, yeah.
We will encourage the review of our reporting, and we will come back during this year. Thanks for your advice or for your comments.
Okay. Okay. Thanks. Just the last one from me. We had incurred a very common loss actually in this quarter due to the foreign exchange fluctuations actually. You highlighted in the document. Are we not hedging our exposures in the foreign exchange basis? We have a lot of inter-foreign currency exposures. Are we not hedging our operations, sir, over there?
I think we have a natural hedge because we had Euro, Euro, USD, as well as Swiss Franc. Alex, please.
Let me say, unfortunately, some of the exposures you could not really hedge. We had one a few years ago already discussed. We have intercompany loans in place within the group, which are between Euro and USD denominated entities. There we face a book loss. However, this is something which you could not avoid if you have loans between entities in two different currencies.
This could go both ways as well.
This could go both ways. We also faced positive impacts in prior quarters. You see, I think especially, I would say one and a half years ago, we had also there a big positive impact.
Okay. Thanks, sir. I'll come back with you. Thank you. All the best.
Thanks.
Thank you.
The next question is from the line of Meet Katrodiya with Niveshaay , please go ahead.
Yeah, sir, thank you so much for the opportunity. Sir, you have given your view on the order backlog for April, right? I was asking from the point of view of what are you seeing in terms of demand which can come in the next month? What are your forecasts for the demand? Are we seeing any bottoming out in chemical or pharma?
Yeah, so I can talk a little bit. I'll talk about two different regions. In India, the conversations that we are having with our clients and these are owner CEOs, they are positive. Like I mentioned, all of them have said a similar statement that volumes have come back. Their plants which are running now at 45-50% are now running closer to 80%. Firstly, that's a positive sign. However, pricing is still under pressure, which means that margins will continue to be under pressure. I do believe that there will be some amount of investment in both chemicals. When I say chemicals, agrochemicals as well as specialty chemicals. Specialty chemicals have continued and have been quite strong. Agrochemicals have been weak. We do expect agrochemicals to return sometime later this year. Pharmaceuticals have continued to be very, very strong, especially Hyderabad-based pharmaceutical companies.
The month of April starts with a very large order, not glass line, but glass line as well as non-glass line drills for Hyderabad. That has been a big kind of positive for us as well. Pharma continues to be quite strong, especially companies that are now working with the GLP-1 kind of manufacturers, peptides, etc. Things like that are really driving a lot of investment as well. Pharma remains quite strong. The inquiry level in pharma also continues. What we are seeing that's different from the past is some of these agrochemical players are now thinking of investment. Some of our big customers like TI, SRF, Decton are now started talking in terms of when the next level or the next building or the next unit will be kind of greenlighted. The inquiry will start. Obviously, the shipment would continue, right?
I do expect a recovery somewhere in the middle of this quarter. The good thing is that we have enough of glass line backlog for the first half of the year. Then we really need to worry about glass line coming into the third or fourth quarter and really helping us. If that agrochemical cycle turns in the middle of the year, that would bode very well for us for the second half of the year as well. In terms of global, I think chemical and pharma sales continues to be below expectations. I think the uncertainty surrounding the tariff situation is obviously holding investments. However, some of these investments are being kind of discussed now. Some of these which have been pushed out are now kind of moving towards closure. There are new areas where have emerged.
If pharma and chemicals slow down, we have seen investment in other Europe and the U.S. in other areas as well, which has made up for some of the shortfalls that we've seen in chemical and pharma. The diversification strategy and our product going into some of these new segments has also kind of helped us make sure that the loss because of chemical and pharma is not that intense.
Yeah, thank you so much for the detailed answer. The last question is that if you can throw some head on any new player has come or existing player facing problem in the market, so how we are positioned as compared to existing players and even newcomers?
I think we have a global manufacturing footprint. Even with the tariff situation that is currently being discussed, we have local manufacturing. For example, if the U.S. tariff situation would create more investment in the U.S., we have a U.S. unit that can supply into the U.S. We also have Brazil where the tariff situation is not so bad, and that can be used to supply into the U.S. market. From a European perspective as well, we are strong. We shut down one facility, so now we have two facilities. Better utilization as well from a glass line perspective. With Poland coming online, much better cost structure as well. India is today focused only on India. As India has also grown, we are now looking at the surrounding areas around Middle East, Southeast Asia to also go and sell some of our products into.
Our heavy engineering business in India has done incredibly well this year and will continue to do very well next year as well. The idea is to grow that business because that kind of catered into oil and gas, petrochemical, power, nuclear, etc., etc., where obviously they are not constrained by the same kind of growth issues that currently chemical and pharmaceuticals are facing, right? Diversification and having multiple product lines in areas that we do not normally participate in will help us kind of make up for some of these shortfalls.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Samanth from Mariculous Investment Managers. Please go ahead.
Good evening, team. My first question is, you did mention that you are closing the U.K. facility. Do you intend to supply the resultant demand from India or from the other two European locations that you have currently?
Yeah, go ahead.
We have closed down the site because of the last few years. We have improved the process in the operations in the German plant and the Italian plant significantly so that we can absorb the capacity that was in the U.S. We took the advantage of this slowdown time to consolidate there and improve our cost position and be more competitive. We also bring in products from India because it has been established a few years ago and very successfully so that we can serve the market even if the market increases significantly. We have overall enough capacity to do so.
It's not a very large market, so I don't think that we're going to expect significant growth in that market. Yet, if the market were to need this equipment, we are well placed to serve that market through our priority sites and even with India.
If the trade agreement with India and the U.K. could be also beneficial where the due deal transaction between India and the U.K. would also help us become more competitive as well.
Got it. Are you still looking to rationalize your manufacturing facilities, or it's largely done?
I think that we are always looking to rationalize and to improve our manufacturing footprint. I think our Poland facility is a start in the right direction, but we do need to add capacity and look at moving costs from expensive locations and high-cost locations to Poland. We also feel that the availability of engineers and welders are easier in some of these locations. We will continue to invest in areas that will help us support our growth and the cost structure that we are looking forward to. Obviously, in India currently, we have already a strong footprint. China and Brazil are also well taken care of. There is no real kind of additional investment that we need as a group. If there is an opportunity to rationalize, we will continue to do so.
Wonderful. Last question is on the India transformation program for which you have incurred around INR 9.8 crore in this quarter. Is all the expenditure related to this program largely done, or should we expect some expenses to be incurred in next financial year as well?
No, no. You could consider that everything is spent.
The total number for the year is around INR 15 crore. That's the full amount that was paid to the advisors who are running this transformation program. On top of that, the INR 5 crore we spent on closure of Hyderabad, that has all been taken in this financial year, INR 20 crore in total. None of those costs will carry forward into the next financial year.
Got it. Thank you so much and all the best.
The next question is from the line of Ronak Oswal from Arihant Capital Markets. Please go ahead.
Thanks for the question. My first question is while going through the financial statement, in segment-wise revenue, technology segment reported is always quarterly. The revenue is last 12 months, and the order intake is also not looking that great. What are your plans to improve it?
Sorry, we could not hear you. Could you repeat the question, please?
Technology segment. Complete reported is always revenue in last 12 quarters. The order intake is also not looking that great. What are your plans to improve it?
Yeah. Order intake in technologies was obviously the result of a slowdown in the glass line business, which was driven by a slowdown in the chemical and pharmaceutical sectors around the world. In India, especially the agrochemical sector. Like I mentioned to you, India started the year with a 20% higher backlog. That is a favorable mix between heavy engineering, glass line, and proprietary products. Obviously, as you can see, some of the glass line business has come back. Internationally as well, the services business has taken a hit in the last financial year. Again, services is something that comes and is fast-moving, so can be converted quite quickly. As Thomas mentioned, we have a very strong pipeline. Some of these orders have already come in in this financial year in the first quarter.
We expect again in the month of May and June to have a strong order intake. The focus is on order intake to make sure that we have utilization and absorption for the next few quarters as well. Some of this has already come back, and some of this is expected, but we are aggressive in the market, and we are trying our best to win as much as possible. Where we cannot win in markets which are constrained by growth, we are trying to win in other areas as well. Heavy engineering mixing, even in India, we have broken into new markets like food and beverage, where we usually did not play. A lot of things are going on.
We have certain businesses which are completely outside chemical and pharma, like Chevron in the U.S., which has done quite well and continues to do quite well. We are just trying to see where the growth is going to come from and where exactly we can compensate for the loss of the glass line business that has happened over the last couple of years because of the slowdown in the chemical sector.
Okay. What amount of growth are you seeing to do this?
We are seeing both numbers as well. In terms of the backlog here in India, you know it's higher, and India will grow. Internationally also, we expect a small amount of growth, but we do expect to have a much better financial performance for the next financial year than we did this year.
Okay, sir got it. And sir, in i nternationally, it was margin stuff. We have seen margin pressure in this quarter as well. When are we looking to take back the margin time in next year's quarter? Can we all target it ahead of time?
Margin pressure this quarter, how much? Yeah, margin pressure this quarter, of course, because of the lower utilization. If utilization comes back and the volumes come back, those margins will look a lot better. India margins, as you have seen in Q4, are already quite strong. We expect that to continue in that kind of range, which is significantly higher than previous year due to all the homework that has gone in. Margins will improve. I'm not here to give any kind of guidance right now because it's still a lot of uncertainty, especially in the international business. As time progresses, as the backlog improves, as we see order intake improve, which we think it will, and some of it has already come in, by the end of Q1, we would be in a better position.
I can say today that, like I said, compared to 12 months ago, I think we are in a better position, and things are looking more positive.
Okay, thank you. That was fantastic.
Thank you.
The next question is from the line of Hardik Gandhi from HPMG Shares and Securities. Please go ahead.
Hello, am I audible?
Yes, go ahead.
Thank you for taking my question. I just wanted to know on the Poland side, what kind of revenue are you expecting from that site and how fast we can ramp up? What's your plan looking for that as it starts for now?
The site is holding as a small entity that was a couple of years of startup where we had a 51% share acquired just recently. The current revenue will be cut triple within the very first year due to the orders we are giving in there. The growth plan is to complete further buildings and increase capacity. In the next few years, it will double again and will come close to EUR 7 million within two to three years even.
Okay. You are saying we are expecting to quarter fill the revenue at least in this year. What is the number we are looking at this year?
It will be close to $5 million.
Just to give you an idea, I think Jaywater is a saleable company for the $1.5 million odd. The recent order that we placed on them for our site in France is close to $4 million, right? That is already a significant increase. Plus, over the year, we will add more. We need to ramp them up as soon as possible because, again, it is a great thought for our two units in Europe. The momentum there and the need of those two units and the quality levels that have come out of Poland have really been very good. I think as time progresses, you will see more and more requirements being given to Poland. If we could ramp up faster, we will, but upfront, we think it takes time.
We will try and ramp up as soon as possible.
Last question. Last quarter here, Poland's revenue is in fact considered as an internal cost improvement plan. It will not be a full top-line revenue improvement installed. As such, we will use it as a manufacturing hub especially for the Marbach and the French entity, which then have or keep the external revenues, but with significantly higher margins.
What kind of margins are we expecting on a ballpark basis?
We said Tarak said already before that we expect an improvement of 30% on the cost base. I would keep it there so that you could do some calculation. We do not want to further comment as of now.
Understood. Thank you sir, all the best one.
The next question is from the line of Vibhav from Laburnum Capital . Please go ahead.
Yeah, I thank you for the opportunity. As I mentioned that in pharma, India volumes have been and outlook has been strong, and international has been relatively easy. With increasing thought about global supply chain diversification out of China, I mean, are you seeing any early benefits of it in India or outside India? That's my first question. Secondly, related to that, are you doing it like sort of early days of seeing impact for that trend happening? Current volume trends in India pharma are largely being driven by the GLP-1, GLP-1?
I mean, the way I look at it, I know six months ago, I would not say no to certain glass line orders. Today, I pick and choose what I want, right? From that perspective, volumes have increased. If I'm starting a third shift now as well, the factory is also buzzing with these additional volumes. The situation at a factory level is definitely much better. From what I speak with people that we have very strong relationships with, owners and stuff, many of them have said that, "Guys, hang in there. Things are looking a lot better. Investment will come." This is more of a general India story, right? I think that is being driven by some of the uncertainties with China, some of the production of China moving to India as well.
I think India will be well placed to capture some of that production as well. Keep in mind, the last couple of years, similar to us, many of the chemical players have also not invested, right? At some point, something will turn, and we will see volumes pick up. The signs are very positive. The start of the year for India looks very, very good. The inquiries in glass line are quite strong, not only in glass line, but across the other two verticals that we have in India, proprietary products and other heavy engineering business. Glass line probably was the weakest one, but glass line has recovered in a night today. All three product lines have a very strong backlog and a very strong outlook as well.
All right. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Rajiv Kalna, an individual investor. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thanks for the opportunity. With the recent geopolitical development, it seems like a significant amount of CapEx is being planned by European countries, especially Germany. This will mainly be in the area of defense, infrastructure, energy, etc. Do we see any opportunities related to our businesses to capitalize on this CapEx growth in the Eurozone, especially given our strong presence in Europe and particularly Germany? A related question to that is, what % of our revenues currently are attributed to Europe?
Yeah. Defense is definitely an area where we do participate. We have seen traction. We have seen recent order intake in the space, and that is definitely something new that has not happened in the past. How does it play out and pan out? I'm not sure. It seems that for European countries and the European Union, defense is one area that they do want to spend money in. We definitely have a play there because we are quite, with our glass-lined equipment, asset recovery system, quite capable of participating in that story as well. That is definitely an area that we are seeing traction in. We hope many of these orders in those spaces will start to materialize if they haven't already.
In terms of European side, you could just maybe look at the U.S. or the Americas as one-third of revenue, Europe as one-third, and Asia as one-third. That's really a ballpark figure. It might have fine-tuned a little bit, but generally, that's a rule of thumb that we are currently working on.
Okay. Thank you so much, and all the best.
Thank you.
The next question is from the line of Ravi Metha from One-up Financial. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hi. Thanks for this call. There was a regulation on SGD, which got pushed to 2025 from 2022 earlier. Does this benefit your systems vertical because I'm not able to see that in the order book or revenue so far? Some color on SGD and opportunities?
Yeah. That is a good one, so FGD, flue gas desulfurization, you're right, regulation has been pushed out. Obviously, that doesn't help those projects to come forward. There are still engaged with a number of customers who are still deploying their FGD projects, so those are going forward. With the regulation being pushed out, I expect new projects can slow down until the regulations are closed, until the deadline is closed.
Do the older projects want SGD unit so you can help with your systems unit for the older ones as a retrofit?
There are projects for FGD that we're executing. Those obviously will continue. As far as new FGD projects for existing units, our conversations with customers that are advanced, those are continuing. I do expect new conversations may get pushed out as customers potentially delay the CapEx that would go into these flue gas desulfurization units because regulation pushed out.
Yeah. I will add quickly, I mean, the related point is SGD or various other technologies. GMM Pfaudler has realized that customers often would like to test their product through a proof of concept before they go into a large investment. To that end, we have now established a test center in our Gujarat facilities. It was inaugurated last quarter by our Managing Director. Here we have the ability to offer customers the ability to try before they buy. They can do a lot of tests around the asset concentration, various other solutions, including SGD kind of applications. We are ready and able to solve these requirements in India. I think that is a big step forward for many of our customers.
Cool. Thanks.
Yeah, thanks, Sam.
The next question is from the line of Rohit Ori from Progressive Shares. Please go ahead.
Hi, team. Three questions. First one, do you think that the cleanup of the balance sheet, which is going to the manufacturing or footprint optimization process, which is ongoing, has that been completed? Or do you think there are some more subsidiaries or sub-ground subsidiaries that you might want to close in the near future?
We have completed two of these site closures this year. On top of that, we have restructured our Swiss units as well. That was also a top unit that we had to clean up. We have that production, the capacity there, the flow of the product has improved significantly. We've brought in the right people to run the supply chain, and the project and the engineering team has also been kind of increased. Three units have been kind of two have been closed, and one has been restructured. We will continue to kind of move production into Poland over the next months and quarters as well. I think in India, we are well-suited and well-placed. China, we have to be there, and we will continue to play in China.
Obviously, the U.S. and Brazilian units work hand in hand to cater to the American market as well. There is an opportunity probably somewhere in South America as well where we have not really had too much of success. That could be an area, especially for our mixing business, where there is a lot of mining and mining companies that would have requirements. Mining for us as mixing has become a very important part of our mixing program. We have had large orders coming in from Australia, even here in India. We will look at targeting some of these big mining companies where lithium extraction or heavy metals, all that kind of stuff that is coming out. We can probably participate in that growth story as well.
Great. He's appointed as his CTO. What are the key short-term and long-term goals which he's assigned?
I think you will hear more about this global transformation program that we are working on. We've had already a great amount of alignment between the management team. I think maybe from a softer aspect, I think over the last year or 18 months, we've really kind of come together as a group. Before that, when the business was great, we were running India and international as two separate companies. During the down cycle, we were really able to sit down and really agree and align on what the company should look like 5, 7, 10 years from now, right? A lot of work has gone into how we want to organize, what our strategies are going to be, what do we want to be known as in terms of our company, and how are we going to bring growth back, right?
Because you know that glass line is a mature business. You know that we are already a market leader with 50% market share. The focus, obviously, in glass line is to improve margins and rationalize manufacturing footprint to a point where the salesperson or the customer should have no say in where this product is made. It should be a supply chain kind of a decision depending on what capacity is available within the group, right? That is the end state that we would like to be. The focus should really be on the other verticals, especially the non-glass line verticals, the heavy engineering verticals, and the systems verticals where growth is really unlimited because those market sizes, those addressable markets are much, much bigger than what glass line is. That is really the theme of the strategy that we are trying to put together.
How do we organize to capture this opportunity? How do we organize to make sure that the people involved in these verticals make the right decision and drive the right behavior? All those things are going to be something that we have discussed, and we will now start implementing. Red Role is going to run this formal transformation program because, as a company, we can't lose sight of the business because business and financial performance is very important. At the same time, we need to transition. What has worked for us for the last 20 years may not work for us for the next 20 years, right? We have to kind of diversify. We have to be creative.
We have to organize better, and we all need to be aligned with the same kind of thought process across the organization so that we create the right behavior amongst our people as well. That is really the kind of transformation. It is really a large transformation program that we are going to do. As the market turns, we will see a lot of these benefits flowing through. We are prepared to put in the hard work to make sure that over the next year or so, we have the program in place. We are motivated. The momentum is there. I think the expectation within the group is also there. The management team is completely aligned, and we are ready to hit the ground running. That is pretty much what Greg is going to run over the next 12 months. Greg is here.
Maybe I'll invite him to say a few words in his first conference call as well and introduce himself. Greg, you'd like to come a little bit closer to the microphone as well so you can speak up, yeah?
Yes. Hi, everyone. Gregory Gelhaus here. Rohit, thanks for your question. As Tarak said, there is a tremendous opportunity within the group. The companies have been extremely successful over the past many, many years. This diversification program has already borne a lot of fruit. There are opportunities to continue to improve. A formal transformation program, as Tarak had highlighted, will really benefit the group. The senior management team is 100% aligned to drive that program. We are looking forward to working together to achieve those aims. It is really forward-looking. We are looking to really make some significant improvements and help to drive that growth and bring that forward for the future.
Thank you. Thank you, Greg. Karth, my last question. You mentioned that you're looking at starting the third stage, Karamstan. How much or what % is attributed to the shift in from Hyderabad, and how much % is attributed to probably the new orders or the green shoots that you see in the order book right now?
Yeah. See, by the time we decided to start Hyderabad, we did not have too much backlog there that came in. There was some, but not significant. The real new backlog that is coming in Glassland is really new orders that have come in, the new investment, the new CapEx that is going in. It is not the Hyderabad growth that is driving this new kind of starting of the third shift, etc., etc. It is real new volume that is being generated from the Indian market. This is without agrochemicals coming back, right? This is still specialty and pharma. If agrochemicals were to come back at some point, that would even kind of add to those volumes.
Great. That's quite encouraging. Thanks for that, Tarak. Thank you, team. Thanks a lot.
Thanks, Rohit.
Thank you. We have a follow-up question. It's from the line of Samyuk. Please go ahead.
Thank you for the opportunity again. Samyuk wanted to understand that we are hearing a lot of traction for the flow reactors from the chemical companies. Samyuk wanted to understand how is GMM placed in the flow reactors, and are we seeing any traction in that?
Is this from H2U? I'm asking about flow reactors, correct?
Correct, yeah.
Oh yeah, continuous chemistry is something that's been sort of on the horizon for a long time in the chemical space. As GMM Pfaudler, we've been equipment manufacturers for batch chemistry also for a very long time, and we've been looking at continuous along the way. As we have studied it, we recognize the potential of continuous chemistry and flow chemistry. We also know better the limitations there are. Based on the studies we have done, we have embarked on a few initiatives at GMM Pfaudler to make sure that as flow or continuous chemistry kicks off, we are positioned to capture that. I'll just add some counsel. First, we have an active collaboration with MCL along with other industry leaders, chemical companies, pharmaceutical companies. We're really the only capital goods company in that alliance.
Rohit is at the forefront of development of flow chemistry in India, and that's in partnership with a U.K. agency as well. At the same time, within our team, we have strengthened our capability in flow chemistry. We have already a couple of products that are available in flow chemistry, and we'll continue to expand that. I think we can rest assured that when flow chemistry really picks up and hits its prime, GMM Pfaudler is ready to create solutions for our customers.
Got it. Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, that was the.
Is there another question? Sorry, I think there's one more question. You want to take that last one, and then maybe we can close.
Okay, sir. It's from the line of Rohit Ori from Progressive Shares. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thank you for the follow-up. Question related to the heavy engineering business. If you can take us through that, what sort of capacity is there at Vatwa? And do you think that there should be a phase two of Vatwa coming soon?
Yeah, we believe we have plenty of room for growth in Watwa itself, certainly for the next couple of years. However, we do anticipate outgrowing that facility out in the future. We are actively working our first draft. The demand is very strong. We believe we have very strong systems in place now. In the past three years that we've been running the factory, there's been very good ramp-up as well as a very good margin expansion over the past three years. We are looking to expand this and do quality shares expansion plan. Right now, we have adequate space in Watwa for the next.
This elevated platform for the bulletin, it runs very close to a plant in Vatva. Do you think that we can play some role via HC for the bulletin project, if any?
No, not really. I wish I could. I mean, we could use a station next to a plant. It would be very convenient. I think the station would be in the city of Ahmedabad. You're right. It runs very close to us. Unfortunately, I think most of the work with that railway has been completed. Yeah, it's not an HC play for us.
Okay. Okay, team. Thank you for answering. Thanks a lot.
Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question for today's conference call. I now hand the conference over to the management for their closing comments.
Thank you, team. Thank you, everyone, for joining us today. It was a pleasure interacting with you, and we look forward to manufacturing interactions during the course of the year. Take care and see you.
Thank you.
Thank you. On behalf of GMM Pfaudler, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines. Thank you.