Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the Q3 FY 2022 results conference call of Motherson Sumi Systems 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 touchtone phone. I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Vivek Chaand Sehgal. Thank you, and over to you, Mr. Sehgal.
Thank you very much. Good afternoon, good evening, friends. I think Q3 saw a recovery in global production with chip shortages easing a little bit. I think it's been a very tough environment with a lot of moving parts, and the board said that the Q3 performance under such circumstances was much better than what was expected.
Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for patiently holding the line. You have the line from Mr. Vivek Chaand Sehgal connected. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Sorry, friends, there was a disconnection. As I was talking, Q3 had seen a recovery in global production and the chip shortages easing a little bit. However, supply chain challenges continue. In such a tough environment, the board actually felt that Q3 performance was very strong. A 14% increase in both revenue and EBITDA on a QOQ basis was well done. We have still more challenges to come with, but I think day by day it's becoming better and better. We expect the global production trends to improve further in the coming months, which should help our performance globally. However, higher costs and other moving parts like, you know, shortages, et cetera, are going to be a challenge, but we will do our best in the coming time.
In this quarter, we have also received the final NCLT approval, which now gives us effect to the proposed reorganization and lays the path for future growth of Motherson, what we call 2.0. I would like to thank all our shareholders and friends for their continued support. I'm sure Motherson 2.0 journey will be even more exciting for our shareholders. The best is yet to come. I hand you over for your questions. We are pleased to answer them.
Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin the question- and- answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on your touchtone 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 a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Binay Singh from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Hi, team. Thanks for the opportunity. Encouraging to see sequential revenue pick up across verticals of Motherson. My question is on PKC. PKC's size is down. We've seen that the EBIT margins have actually compressed sequentially. Could you talk a little bit about that, what part of it is actually sort of driven by mix and what is driven by any one-off costs also? Thanks.
Sure. Pankaj Mital, can you take that, please?
Thank you, Chaand, sir. Binay, basically in PKC, we have been hit in two geographies. One is in China, but if you look at sequential, it's more coming from North America, where the volumes dipped and the supply chain issues became more and more pronounced in the last quarter. That led to very erratic supplies of parts, both at the customer end and as well as at our plants, leading to higher costs. China volumes remained low in both the quarters compared to the past by about 60%. After the emission changes, the volumes have not picked up to that level. As the inventories are in the market, and we believe that in the next three to six months, those inventories should get exhausted and the market should come back. Thanks.
Sir, in absence of China recovery, where do you see PKC margin settling? Also earlier in the previous quarter, you talked about two new platforms starting in PKC, so there were costs associated with that also that came in Q1 and Q2. Those costs are not there in this quarter. Fair to assume that?
Yes, those improvements have taken place, and all the support which was given globally has been withdrawn. The plants are operating on their own. Those additional costs and expedited freights which were there, they have been taken care of.
Right. What kind of numbers do you expect then in case China does not recover and the U.S., because demand is much stronger on the U.S. side, so there is good visibility on recovery there?
See, there are multiple challenges as you have seen in the market, that the demand has been there, the demand is quite strong. Yet the production is not, it's quite erratic because of the material shortages. That's taking the toll because sometimes the plants are running for the customers and sometimes they have to go for sit down. Secondly, there are certain issues, which are relating to supply chain and inflationary trends in the market, including the wages which have been growing at abnormal rate in this period. We are taking care of them. Many of the challenges are being sorted out internally by optimizing the cost, and some of them are being taken care of with the customers by working jointly together with them to get to a normalized level.
Okay, sir. Thanks. I'll come back in the queue.
Thank you. Before we take the next question, a reminder to the participants, if you wish to ask a question, please press star then one. The next question is from the line of Jinesh Gandhi from Motilal Oswal Financial Services. Please go ahead.
Hi, sir. My question pertains to PKC. Just continuation of earlier question. Would it be fair to say that China business is largely through JVs, and would not have impacted the EBITDA margins for PKC?
It does impact because out of the three JVs, two are consolidated.
That has direct impact. Would there be any copper price related impact in PKC or rather for entire wiring harness business? Would the peak of copper price impact be behind us?
Copper price impact has also been there because, you know that the, trigger is like every six months, the prices get adjusted based on the past trends. Still the copper price has been at a high level. The kind of impact which is there, in the past, say six months ago, is reduced, but still there is a copper lag which continues. As they remain at a high level of around $10,000.
Right. Okay. Understood. Second question pertains to SMR. We have seen a reasonably high impact here on margins. This is primarily largely led by resin cost increases or anything else is there?
Sure. Vivek, would you want to take that or would you want to give it to Rajat?
Yeah. I think Rajat can answer this.
Okay, great.
Yeah. It's been a mix of issues. I mean, of course, the volume that has been impacted, you know, because of the chip shortage. That's the primary driver. Then of course, there are headwinds on commodities. You know, resin prices have gone up, and aluminum also is a part of, you know, the commodity wave. It's a combination of various factors. As you see, you know, quarter-on-quarter, we have recovery on the sales side. You would also see therefore that the margins are also following the trend and we have improvement there. Definitely I think there are a lot of things that we continue to work upon in terms of optimization of cost internally and also working with the customers. I think we would see improvement going forward, as we see the sales also going up. I think this would show an improvement as we go forward.
Okay. Because, I mean, quite a few other commodities, including aluminum, and maybe even resin prices also might still see further increases given the increase in crude prices. You expect near-term pressures to sustain on margins or because of operating leverage and improvement in production, there should be still sequential improvement in SMR business as such?
Yeah, you are right. I mean, we do see still I think in the last few months that this commodity price is still continuing to go up. I mean, we've seen the same on the aluminum. We've seen the same in the resins also. We were all hoping that this would kind of stabilize in this quarter. We'll have to wait and watch how this plays out. It's anybody's guess at this point. We are on top of it and seeing what is the best that we can do to manage it internally as well as in discussion with our customers. Hard to say how it moves in the next few months. We'll have to see how it goes. Yeah.
Sure. Clearly we are seeing improvement in production levels in SMR and SMP because of underlying improvement at OEM level, right? That is the positive thing.
The volumes have, I mean, the chip shortage challenge has not disappeared. It still is there in pockets and, you know, it keeps on coming back in different shapes. I think we would have still some continued pressure on that side. Overall, if you see the volumes have improved. I mean, Q2 to Q3, the volumes have gone up and, I mean, what we can see in terms of EDI is also coming from the customers. It is showing a bit positive trend. While the overall challenge remains in the industry, I think the trend is looking favorable.
Okay. Fourth quarter also ideally should be higher volumes because supplies have further improved. Would that be a fair assumption?
For the immediate, short- term, what we have, you know, visibility in the EDI, it looks better. As I said, you know, there are surprises which keep coming all the time.
Sure. That's true.
It's thoughtful time.
Thanks. Last question with respect to the financial reporting. Would we be reporting the new SAMIL financials going forward from fourth quarter, given that large part of entire restructuring process hopefully will be get done by the financial year end? The steady reporting which happens, would that be now just for the new SAMIL?
Kunal, can you take that please?
Jinesh, it will be for new SAMIL and MSWIL separately from quarter four.
Great. Thanks for the clarification. I'll fall back in queue. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you.
The next question is from the line of Raghunandhan from Emkay Global. Please go ahead.
Thank you, sir, for the opportunity, and good to see the sequential performance improvement. Sir, couple of questions. Firstly, Europe gas energy costs seem to be going higher as highlighted by some of your peers. Has there been any impact on margins? If any color you can share on how big is the impact, and are you seeing any reduction in these costs?
Well, I'll let Vaaman answer this question, but basically, you know, we are not a huge power guzzler. Vaaman, can you take this?
Yeah, sure. Definitely there have been energy cost increases which have been substantial. Definitely the impact like Pankaj is saying is different for different verticals. [Obviously, bio pharma side] not as much as perhaps some of the other verticals that are there. These costs are unusual and have spiked in the last couple of quarters. We do believe that in the longer -term these prices should come down and settle. In the meantime, we are putting in place countermeasures to let's say get efficiency from other places to be able to get back the returns that we are losing because of the higher energy costs. Like I said, we believe that in the longer- term, this should come back to a normalized level.
Thank you. My second question is, for the new SAMIL, pro forma numbers have been given. Would it be possible to share the net worth and gross debt for the entity? I was trying to calculate the return ratios.
Kunal?
Yeah. The gross debt numbers can be imputed from, I guess, what's there on slide 24, which is the net debt. If you look at slide 18, which has the gross debt component. The net worth piece is something in the works. It's just happened on December 31st. We will come back to you in Q4 with the details.
Sure. Thank you, Kunal. I'll come back in the queue. That's all from my side.
Thank you. A reminder to the participants, if you have a question, please press star then one. The next question is from the line of Siddhartha Bera from Nomura. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, sir. Thanks for the opportunity. My first question is on the margin performance in the standalone business. If I look at the trend between standalone ex-MSWIL margin performance and MSWIL margin performance, it seems there is a difference because the standalone margin seems to have dropped quite sharply on a YOY basis, flat QOQ. DWH performance has been or MSWIL performance has been much better. Any thoughts here, why is that, and what can be the sustainable margin to look forward to?
Kunal, would you take this or Vaaman?
Yes, sir, I will try. Siddhartha, DWH is catering to the domestic market customers, where we have a pass-through of the copper as well as of the foreign exchange. While in quarter three also you have seen compared to quarter two, there has been an adverse impact of copper, but the impact is minimal. At the same time, globally, some of these contracts are half-yearly or have a different terminology. Also, you have seen the euro has weakened in the last quarter. The overseas business margins move in a range because of the fluctuation in the foreign exchange rate. That is where you can see some marginal change in those rates. On a business side, I think the business continues to perform well. There could be increase in freight cost, both incoming and outgoing, which will have a larger impact on the export business.
In general, sir, in the standalone ex-MSSL, MSWIL business also, a large part comes from India only, if I see, INR 10 billion out of INR 13 billion. Is there any, I mean, difference in the product profile margins between these two businesses also?
No, sir. There will be the sale of wires which will also get accounted for in the ex- DWH business on a gross basis. When the copper price has moved up, while there is a compensation coming from the domestic customer, both MSSL and KIML, to the wire factory, but as a percentage it will show mathematically a decline. From a business point of view, there is no change.
Okay. Got it. Second question is again on this standalone business. Like, we have shared in the SMRP business, our EV share of revenues is closer to 3.5%, and we have said in the past, like, 25% of our order book is coming from EV. In your India business, will it be possible to share any of these numbers or your aspiration, if possible?
Siddhartha, we are in the process of relaying out our presentations and how we will present to you, and that is in that direction. We also presented you the EBITDA margins of our different business vertical. We take your inputs and would look how we can give the data without impacting our strengths.
Okay, sir. Okay. Thanks a lot.
If I might add, I hope you have taken note of the EV data we have provided in terms of it now being 3.5% or more than 3.5% of our consolidated sales. What was around about INR 1,100 crores in H1 is more than INR 1,900 crores now.
Yes . Got it.
Thanks.
Mr. Bera, do you have any more for further questions?
No, no. I am done. Thank you. That's all.
Thank you. I'd like to remind all participants present in this conference, if you wish to ask a question, please press star then one on your touchtone telephone. The next question is from the line of Joseph George from IIFL. Please go ahead.
Thank you for this opportunity. When I look at the consolidated numbers, there are, you know, five segments, there is standalone SMR, S&T, PKC and others. In this others, there is a significant, I mean, it's a small segment, but there's a significant deterioration in profitability. Does this others primarily include MWSI, which would have seen a pretty similar trajectory or similar impact as you have seen in PKC? Is that a correct conclusion to make?
You're talking about the wiring harness, is it? Kunal, can you?
Joseph, are you referring to the PAML details?
No, I'm talking about the segmental revenue and segmental results as per the format where you have five segments: standalone SMR, S&T, PKC and others. My question is the biggest component in this others MWSI and has MWSI seen a similar, you know, margin impact because of operating costs, etc. , as you alluded to in the context of PKC? Of course, the time angle is not there, but the rest of it.
I mean, this is the rest of the world, so some of the businesses, which are in 100% subsidiaries are not MWSI. They have a decline in the profitability, particularly from Europe. We will get back to you in detail on this.
Thank you, sir. That's the only question I had. Thank you.
Mr. Joseph, the thing is, we have now virtually 4 wiring harness systems. You know, your question is pretty vague on which one are you asking about. We have domestic wiring harness business, which has now come out as a different company. We have PKC, we have MWSI. You also have a wiring harness business which is supplying to our own companies and also exports out of India. That's the reason, you know, you have to be a bit more specific, but I understand you're referring to one of the pages of our own presentation. Okay.
Sure, sir. Thank you. I'll take it up with the team one-on-one. Thank you.
Yeah. Yeah.
Thank you. A reminder to the participants, if you wish to ask a question, please press star then one on your touchtone telephone. This is a reminder to all participants present in this conference, if you wish to ask a question, please press star then one at this time. The next question is from the line of Chirag Shah from Edelweiss. Please go ahead. Mr. Chirag Shah, you may please go ahead with your question, sir. Your line is unmuted. Mr. Chirag Shah from Edelweiss, your line is unmuted. You may please go ahead with your question. As there's no response from the current participant, we move on to the next question from the line of Binay Singh from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead. Mr. Binay Singh, you may please go ahead with your question.
Hi team, my question has already been answered. Thank you.
Thank you. Before we take the next question, a reminder to the participants again. If you have a question, please press star then one. The next question is from the line of Chirag Shah from Edelweiss. You may please go ahead again, sir.
Yeah. Hi. Am I audible? Thanks for the opportunity. Hello.
Yeah. Go ahead, please.
Yeah. Sir, so just a follow-up question on SMR and SMP profitability. Would it be right to assume that the drag on margins when we look at on YOY basis or versus the historical performance is largely because of commodities? If that is the case, then if you can help us understand how does the pass-through arrangement work? When can we see these underrecoveries neutralizing or normalizing, assuming there is no significant further cost inflation?
Vaaman, would you like to take that?
Yeah, sure. It's different by the different product group, as you can imagine. You know that different countries, different customers, different product groups, so contracts are different in those different geographies and companies. Definitely, I guess I can start by talking more generally, and the team can support for the individual companies if you have more questions. Generally the thing is, Chirag, that at the end of the year, we go back of course to the customers and then we talk about the movements in the prices of commodities et c. over the year. Of course, that happens on an annual basis, measured on a quarterly basis.
Depending on volumes, depending on these price movements, depending on agreed price downs et cetera, all of those are factored in and a talk happens with the customers to see what is left and what is right, and a balanced approach is taken. You know, we do and massage that again towards the end of this quarter. You know, a lot of those things will come back to normal. Moving forward this time, you know, at least a huge aberration that we have seen, you know, not only in the commodity price, but like, Pankaj sir was also talking earlier about, you know, labor increases et c.
These are all things which are really out of our hand and out of the supplier's hand, and these are things that, you know, normalize in discussions with the customer. They are, you know, a negotiation that takes place at the end of the year. We are moving from a period of high volatility, and hopefully some of the worst is behind us. We're moving, you know, we've always said that we are cautiously optimistic. You have seen that uptick in the quarter-on-quarter. We hope that that trend continues, and that there is more stability moving forward. This is quite unusual time with everything kind of spiking in the last couple of quarters. Those and the customers are definitely open to having those discussions with us and seeing what is the fair outcome of what happens down the line.
This is helpful, Vaaman, but would it be right that generally, Q1 of the calendar year is the year when you have these discussions with your customers or a large part of customers given different geography?
It is a running discussion, but you know, it happens more because there's a lot of other things that are also happening, right? The price downs for the year-on-year, so those kind of all those things happen generally towards this during this time. They take a balanced view for the entire year. But of course, during the year, if there is a couple of quarters where there is extreme movement, we have those conversations then at that time as well.
This is helpful. The second question was, if I take SMR as an example, there was a time that we were doing EUR 400 million consistent quarterly revenue. In your assessment, by when can we go to that number given the supply chain bottleneck and your interactions with your customers, when that normalization could be achieved? Because before the COVID, pre-COVID, we were consistently doing EUR 400 million revenue quarterly basis, plus or minus, you know. Based on your best assessment or best guess, let me use that word, is it a 12-month away scenario, or how should one look at it?
I think three to six months. Sorry, go ahead, Vaaman.
Pankaj, I think as you mentioned it, we are hoping that, again, the next six months things are a lot more stable as both where we see them right now. There's still a lot of, you know, stop and go because of the semiconductor shortage et cetera, which is still there. We had also said that in the last call that we do see it hanging around for another couple of quarters. Hopefully by then things should be a lot more stable.
By H2, let's hope that most of the issues are behind us. We can build a schedule and rate that you are doing that it's now better.
We hope so too, Chirag, that things become a lot more normal moving forward.
Okay. This is helpful. Thank you very much and all the best.
A reminder to participants, if you wish to ask a question please press star then one on your touchtone telephone. This is a reminder to all participants present in the conference, if you wish to ask a question, please press star then one at this time. Participants, if you wish to ask a question you may press star then one on your touchtone telephone. Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question for today. I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Vivek Chaand Sehgal for his closing comments.
Yeah. Thank you very much. Look, I think this quarter under the circumstances was very tough, but yet, we have delivered better than expected results. I think the effort is going to continue even harder in the last quarter that's coming up now. We are generally seeing positive response coming from the customers. Also the opportunities on acquisitions is increasing day by day. Let's hope we can share some good news. Chirag, just for the reference you said, I hope it comes back to normal. Well we think it will go beyond normal. Wait and just see. The best is yet to come. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of Motherson Sumi Systems Limited, we conclude this conference. Thank you all for joining. You may now disconnect your lines.