Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to GE T&D India Limited 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 conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star then zero on your touchtone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Ms. Tanvi Gupta from GE T&D India Limited. Thank you, and over to you, ma'am.
Thanks, Tina. Good evening, everyone. We welcome you to the GE T&D India Limited earnings call for the first quarter of financial year ending March 31, 2024. I'm Tanvi Gupta from GE T&D Finance and Investor Relations team. We're delighted to have you all here on this call. During the call, we'll discuss about the company's financial performance, including operational highlights, share the key updates, and we'll address the questions if you have any. Before we begin, I would like to highlight three important notes for today's call. Firstly, as we just have declared the results for the first quarter of the financial year 2024, the same results are available on our company website. We have also prepared an analyst presentation for the quarter, which will be under discussion during this call. The said presentation has been emailed to you and is also available on our company website.
I would like to take a moment to remind everyone that today's discussion may contain few forward-looking statements which are subject to risks and uncertainties. These statements are based on our current expectations, and the actual results may differ materially from those expected or implied. We encourage you to refer to our public filings and disclosures for a comprehensive understanding of the factors that could impact our future performance. Let me introduce the GE T&D India management team who will be available on the call. During this call, we'll be joined by Mr. Sandeep Bindaria, CEO and the Managing Director of the company. Along with him, we'll be joined by Mr. Sushil Kumar, Whole Time Director and CFO of the company; Mr. Abhishek Srivastava, Head Business Operations; Mr. Anshul Madan, Communications Leader; and Ms. Anushya Garg, Company Secretary of the company.
We'll be having a dedicated question and answer session towards the end of the presentation, where you can ask your question and seek clarification on topic of your interest. Thank you once again for joining us today. We appreciate your continued support and trust in GE T&D India Limited. I'll hand over the call to Sandeep for his opening remarks. Over to you, Sandeep.
Thanks, Tanvi, and good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you for joining the call. We sincerely hope that you and your families are in good health and safe. Today, we are connecting from our Pallavaram plant, which is based in Chennai, where we manufacture cutting-edge products to monitor, control, and safeguard the power grids and its assets. We have also invited our Board of Directors to join us in the Chennai plant for the board meeting and finalize the results of the last quarter, and take the opportunity to showcase our world-class manufacturing facilities in Pallavaram and Tadipatri, which manufactures our HVS products in this visit. Before we dive into the details of our Q1 performance, I'm delighted to announce the release of our annual report for the financial year 2022, 2023. The report highlights our accomplishments over the past year and provides valuable insights into the market outlook.
We encourage you to explore the report and learn more about GE T&D. A copy of this report is readily available on our website. Additionally, we are excited about our upcoming Annual General Meeting, scheduled on 21st of August, a recording of which will be accessible on our website afterwards. Turning to the results of Q1 2023-2024, I am pleased to share that our team has achieved a commendable results with significant growth in order and improved margins. The improvement can be attributed to our unwavering focus on execution and our ability to capitalize on opportunities in the thriving Indian power market. In Q1 2023-2024, our order book amounting to INR 10 billion, a significant increase of 16% compared to INR 6 billion in Q1 2022-2023. This demonstrates a strong demand for our products and services in the market.
Our sales for Q1 2023-2024 reached INR 7.2 billion, showing a remarkable increase of 21% year-on-year growth compared to INR 5.9 billion. This impressive performance highlights the effectiveness of our strategies and robust operations. Our profit before tax and exceptional item stood at INR 386 million, showcasing a positive growth trend compared to the profit before tax and exceptional item at INR 1.003 billion in Q1 2022-2023. We have achieved improvement in our financial position by reducing the debt by INR 560 million in this quarter. Our debt at the end of the quarter stands at INR 117 billion, as compared to INR 173 billion, a reduction of INR 560 million. This indicates our dedication in maintaining a healthy balance sheet and improving our financial stability.
The order backlog for Q1 as of 2023, 2024 stands at stronger INR 39.4 billion. I'll now hand over to Abhishek for the execution comments.
Hi, good evening. I will, I will share with you all the key operational highlights for our company. In the, in the quarter, we had made some good progress in terms of execution and commission some critical substations, which are going to strengthen the transmission network of our country. One of the key contributions was commissioning of, of 400 kV GIS substation for our customer, ReNew in Koppal, Narendra. This particular substation is going to help in, in enabling evacuation of renewable power and strengthening the grid connectivity of the state of Karnataka. After that, another key contribution or achievement that we could make was 765 kV GIS base at Dhusan, which at Jawaharpur for Dhusan, which is for evacuation of the power from thermal power plant, which is being set up by Dhusan.
That is going to help in terms of strengthening the power network for the state of Uttar Pradesh. After that, another key milestone that was reached was commissioning of 765 kV and 400 kV substation for Adani at as a part of a scheme which is known as WKTL Warora-Kurnool Transmission Limited. That was one of key challenging projects for us, which we were able to successfully commission in the quarter. After that, another key milestone that was achieved was commissioning of 220 kV GIS for the HPPCL at Guma, and that helps in strengthening the transmission network for the state of Himachal Pradesh. Another area where we have contributed was in terms of commissioning the substation for Karnataka's Kerala State Electricity Board, KSEB at Shornur.
110 kV GIS has been commissioned, and that helps in strengthening the electricity network of the state of Kerala. With this, I hand over the mic to Sushil for financial updates.
Thanks, Abhishek. Good evening, everyone. I move to page 5 on the presentation and talking about the order intake for quarter 1. As Sandeep mentioned, that we achieved an order booking of INR 10,066 million during the quarter, which represented a 68% growth versus last year. During the quarter, we booked some of the key orders, which included the supply of 765 kV GIS and 400 kV GIS with Bus Duct for Power Grid for Raigarh, Kotra project. Supply of 12 number of 765 kV shunt reactor for a private company, private transmission company in India. Supply of 400 kV and 220 kV GIS for Karnataka Power Transmission Corporation at Dumal Sondra and Malling from a private transmission company and few more.
These are the major projects that we won during the quarter, which added up to the order booking of INR 10,066 million for the quarter. Moving to the next page, on the financial, page six, we achieved a revenue of INR 7,176 million. This represented 21% increase year-on-year versus the last year quarter one number. We have an improved performance also on the profitability side, where our EBITDA stood at INR 628 million, representing 8.7% of revenue, which was 3.5 percentage points higher than the last year. Similarly, we had a significant improvement on the profit before tax and exceptional item, which stood at INR 386 million. Again, a significant improvement versus last year.
In fact, if you see the last column on the page, for the entire financial year, 2020-2023, we achieved a profit before tax and exceptional item of INR 381 million. The quarter profitability is higher than the entire last year profitability, which is a significant progress and similar improvement in the profit after that. We talked about net debt improvement. We generated INR 560 million of cash flow during the quarter, which helped us to bring our net debt to a low level of around INR 1,170 million. To summarize, improvement across all key financial KPIs during the quarter. Moving to the next page, page 7, we have shown the, the, the breakup of orders in terms of export orders and the domestic orders.
Out of INR 10,066 million, about 22% of the orders were from the export market, and about 78% of the orders were from the domestic market. However, on the revenue side, out of INR 7,178 million of revenue, 70% of the revenue was from the domestic market, and 30% revenue came from the execution of export orders. Order backlog, INR 39,703 million. Of this, 72% orders are from the private company or private customers, 11% orders from the state-related, and 17% from the private, central and public sector enterprises. Also, in this presentation, we have included some of the key related party approvals, for which the, the information or the revelations happen even in the AGM notice to the shareholders.
We thought it important to have a page to explain the nature of these transactions, so that shareholders may ask any questions if they have due to the clarification. These resolution are resolution number 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8. The first 3 resolution, as we have summarized on the page 8 of the presentation, are related to GE India Industrial Private Limited. This is a repeat approval, meaning every year we take approval for the transaction with GE India Industrial Private Limited, because this, the, the overall transaction with this entity exceeds the materiality limit. Most of these transactions are related to the intra-corporate borrowing. In this resolution, we are seeking an approval of borrowing at any point of time up to INR 5,000 million. Intra-corporate deposits of up to INR 1,500 million.
There is a reduction versus the approval that we have got last year. Last year, we got approval of INR 7,000 million of borrowing. As we have improved our cash performance, our borrowings are lower, hence we have reduced the requirement of intra-corporate borrowing as well. In addition to this intra-corporate borrowing and deposit, there are potential of having the sale and purchase transactions to the extent of INR 1,000 million. Other services, which include common services, recharge, et cetera, to the extent of INR 1,350 million, and INR 150 million for sharing the common facility and e-billing. These three resolutions, which are repeat in nature with GE India Industrial Private Limited, are proposed for the approval of the shareholder. The next resolution, Resolution 7, is for the Grid Solutions FES, which is a French organization, where we have many transactions.
We do buy components from this entity for our factories. We do sell finished products and components to this entity on a regular basis. However, due to increased global, global market situation and having order pipeline at Grid Solutions FES, we believe that there is an opportunity where GET India can have more export orders from this entity across many geographies. Hence, we are seeking the shareholder approval, which will help us in growing our export order book and improving the execution and profitability for the company. INR 4,400 million of sale purchase order with Grid Solutions FES, and about INR 1,600 million order transaction approval for the sale and purchase of other services. The last resolution is with respect to Grid Solutions (UK) Limited.
We have also got a similar resolution in 2021. As the shareholders would know that, Grid Solutions UK, UK Grid Solution Limited, is a technology partner, for they are, they are the ones who basically, lead the technology on the HVDC front. They are leading, many discussions with many customers for booking the large HVDC projects globally, and we are in discussion with UK Grid Solution Limited to see if there is a potential of, booking part of the scope of that project through products and services from Grid, India, GE India Limited. Accordingly, we have proposed for an approval of INR 11,500 million for sale and purchase of goods, and INR 500 million for sale and purchase of services. These are the 5 resolution, and we seek, shareholder support in the upcoming AGM.
In case you have any questions, please ask during the meeting. With that, we open up for the questions. Thank you.
Thank you very much. We will now begin with the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their 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. Thank you. We take the first question from the line of Mohit Kumar from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead, sir.
Yeah, good evening. Congratulations on good set of numbers. My first question is on the transmission ordering flow. Are you seeing a larger traction inquiry for various power transmission equipment you provide, given the fact that there is a large transmission, large building pipeline is building up? Is that the correct assessment?
Yeah, thanks, Mohit. Yes, we see a very large pipeline getting built up because of the evacuation of renewable capacities. If I'm not mistaken, there are about, I think, about 28-30 projects of Tariff-Based Competitive Bidding, which have been rolled out by RVPNL. If you look at the three-year pipeline of the projects which have got approved, I think, it gives a good amount of confidence for the future of transmission, at least for next four to five years.
Understood, sir. My second question is on the annual report. I think you have spoken at length about the Revamped Distribution Sector Scheme, RDSS. What is the opportunity? What are the offerings we have for this particular, you know, digital opportunity? And any color on the opportunity size, and any color on the, you know, the fact that the... a lot of bids are coming up. Can you please comment on the same?
RDSS, yes, because RDSS will require a lot of control centers to be built in with the distribution company. We are very strongly present in this market for ADMS, and in fact, we have built one other under this scheme as well. Yes, I would still not comment on the market size too much, because most of the states are evolving in terms of their requirement. Somewhere where they are only looking for a very optimized kind of a solution, there we have a very low, less amount of play, like in a project of about maybe INR 200 crore, we have a play of about INR 30-35 crore.
In certain projects where the higher amount of ADMS and other applications are required, we may have a play which might go to about 30%-40% of the project size as well. Many of the states are still working on what kind of requirement they want to have. It's a little difficult to comment at this point of time, the market size, but yes, I would say that it's going to be a good market at least for next two years.
Are we, are you offering a SCADA solution? Is that the right understanding?
Yes. Basically, ADMS is a type of SCADA solution, but normally in our parlance, we call SCADA more less associated with the substation. When, when it is for a larger scheme of things, for example, for a circle or for a district, then it is called more or less like a control center with ADMS, so Advanced Distribution Management System.
Understood. My last question to you, in the annual report, you're talking about Wide Area Monitoring System, which is awarded to GE T&D in 2014, and expecting WAMS of similar size to be launched soon. Has it been launched? What, what is the size of the last Wide Area Monitoring System project?
That was, I think, as you said, 2014, and probably those price benchmarks are not relevant. Yes, the discussion has started and maybe we expect another large project. That is. We are not expecting that project to come in this year, but maybe next year.
Understood. Understood. Thank you, Abhay Sir. Thank you.
Yes, thank you.
Thank you. We take the next question from the line of Subhadeep Mitra from Nuvama Wealth and Investments Limited. Please go ahead, sir.
Good evening. Thank you for the opportunity. My first question is with regard to, you know, the healthy order inflow that we have seen and your commentary on the fact that the renewable-related DND CapEx is now picking up. Would you have any targeted number in terms of order inflow for, let's say, the current year or the next year or any targeted market share?
Definitely our expectation or our confidence level is better than last year. I will still say that, we will be more confident of the numbers maybe a quarter later than where we are today. I can tell you that, as I said, when Mohit had asked the question, with the kind of business in the pipeline, our confidence level is much higher this year.
Understood. Would there be any, I mean, market size that you're looking at in terms of what could be, you know, your addressable TAM?
Subhadeep, what we have seen is that in the market size, especially in the first quarter, what has happened, and this is my experience for last three to four years, you know, the various PBJB projects, they can shift the market size by say, $hundreds of millions in a year. Because, you know, sometimes it gets stuck up in the decision-making because of some geographical reason, because of some law-related reasons. I am still expecting that excluding HVDC, the market size will be more than $3 billion this year, $3 billion for us.
This is excluding HVDC?
Excluding?
Excluding.
HVDC. Yes.
Okay, understood. Secondly, with regards to the margins, I mean, congratulations on a great margin recovery. Can we assume that, you know, this would be the new normal in terms of margins, possibly the older projects which had a lower margin profile have already been executed?
Subhadeep, this quarter we had a gross profit of 21.7%. Overall, I'll say that, yes, the confidence level is higher, but let's not evaluate on quarterly basis, and I think more on a yearly basis, we should be better than the last year.
Understood. Some of your peers, et cetera, have been, you know, talking about double-digit margins, et cetera. Would you, as a target, let's say, spread over the next couple of years, would you be shooting for some of those kinds of margins, let's say, aspirational?
Definitely, I think, Subhadeep, it's a good news that if your competitors are speaking about double-digit margins, why not? We will also attempt.
Okay, Sir. Understood. Thank, thank you so much for answering my question.
Thank you, sir. Before we take up the next question, a reminder to all the participants, anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and 1 on the touchtone telephone. We take the next question from the line of Umesh Raut from PhillipCapital. Please go ahead, sir.
Yeah, good evening, sir. Congratulations for the healthy quarter. My first question is basically regarding this IE integration CapEx, which is planned at about INR 240,000 over the course of next seven, eight years. Out of that, how much of would be related to, say, 765 kV beyond or in between 400 kV beyond and less than that?
I think if I really look at about the 765 and 400 kV put together, probably that will contribute, maybe about like, 75% of maybe slightly more than that.
Got it. Is it, is it fair to assume that your market share relatively would be higher in case of 765 and also in case of 400 kV?
Yes, sir, we are primarily a, we are primarily a transmission company. We don't operate into like 33 and 11 KV. Yes, what you are saying is right, that over the years, we have built a much stronger product portfolio and our presence in 765 and 400 KV.
Got it. Because you were the first in terms of localizing, technology related to higher voltage level, products, is it also fair to assume, assuming a, fairly stabilized raw material prices going forward, your gross margins would be kind of touching closer to 34%-35% more of, say, longer term?
We always aim for the higher gross margins. Last year, when we talked, we talked, order booking margin between the range of 27%-29%. Aim to improve with the execution. First quarter results has been good. We have around 31.7% margin. Aim is always that we, we try to improve the margin. We'll not be giving a guidance in the margin term, yes, the, the entire management team works on improvement beyond their other business goals.
Got it, understood. That's heartening to know. My second question is more on the data center side, where you are mentioning, higher demand for extra voltage products from data center. How much big potential opportunity is there from data center for you? What could be the addressable size out of, say, total CapEx for data center?
Unmesh, I'll say that, you know, what the overall market data center is not. I would not say that it's a substantial market. The primary reason is that when you look at individual, each P2P project of 765 kV, that is huge in volume. Data center today in India are getting built for a lower capacity, so most of the data centers are at 220 kV level. Market, if you look at the overall market size, yes, they are not so, so big, but definitely because this business allows us to get connected with global companies and build your global relationship, so it always remains as a focus market for us. We are more targeting the data centers and trying to push our products of GIS, transformers, control automation, and at few places also on basis.
Got it. Third question is more of towards resolution number 8, that you mentioned in your opening remark, that there is a potential opportunity to work out in the global framework of HVDC market. Can you please quantify how large this could be? And this particular element of INR 3 crore kind of resolution, which is now under process, whether those are upcoming orders or potential orders for you?
Just a second. So this is not. This is basically total we are talking about is more than INR 1,000 crore. There is discussion ongoing with our global teams, but it is not like nothing concluded and things like that. Maybe I'll try to add, if you can. With GTD solution, as I said, we also have a regular business, which is sale and purchase of component and finished goods. Generally, that volume is in the range of INR 100 crore-INR 150 crore on an average. The large other opportunity from the HVDC segment is expected to be in the range of INR 700 crore-INR 1,000 crore.
There can be multiple opportunities, one opportunity. That's the volume that we see. We are in discussion with the global counterparts to see if part of those orders can be booked in the GTEL area for the explosion.
Got it. Would it be fair to assume that profitability would be kind of closer to what it is currently?
That will also depend upon the profitability at which they will be able to close the deals with the end customers.
Got it. Sir, last question is more of on the industrial side. You have booked 1 order from Vindankur during the quarter. How is the ordering outlook for industrial space, whether it is from metal or refining or a cement kind of industry?
On the, on the metal space, yes, I think, there's a lot of investment which was happening, is happening, so a lot of expansion plans are being seen. We are also targeting few orders in this quarter from the metal space. Refineries, of course, whatever upgradation was happening has happened, so at least in near future, I'm not seeing any big opportunities coming out of the refinery space. Definitely, we, you know, as, as Sushil has showed you also, the, in the order intake and in the order backlog, the share of private customers is increasing. Our focus towards private customer remains very strong, which includes the industrial segment as well.
Got it, sir. Thank you so much, and all the best.
Thank you. We'll take the next question from the line of Bhavin Vithlani from SBI Mutual Fund. Please go ahead, sir.
Congratulations, Sandeep, on your new role and good start.
Thank you.
The question is, first, if you could just give us a color about utilization at various facilities, and from a past interaction, we understand, AIS and GIS facilities were underloaded.
Bhavin, I think one of the things what we have seen is that we have converted our lines into more lean and also kind of a flexible lines. Probably, for example -- not probably, but for example, earlier we had 3 dedicated lines for different voltages, now they have been converted. I would, I would say that we have been using one of the plants, and that is because of some stress on one of the markets where we used to export. The utilization was, I would say, slightly lower, I would put it that in other plants, the utilization has been much better this year. Difficult to give a number because, you know, the utilization also depends upon the voltage and number of equipments to be made.
It's, it's a combination of a lot of things which define the utilization. I think the results speak about that, things are now looking up.
Okay. Can you talk about the pricing? Because what we understand from talking to industry experts that on an average, the pricing of, of the transformers or switchgears is roughly 35%-40% higher than what it used to be pre-COVID levels.
Bhavin, yes, you are right, they are higher, definitely. There is a big, you know, a big component of the cost increase as well. For example, if you look at the prices of CRGO, oil, foreign exchange, copper, everything is contributed to increase in cost. The good part is that the manufacturers have been able to pass on these increasing cost to the customers. Yes, there have been increase in market prices, but they have been passed on to the customers, rather than getting absorbed into the margins.
Sure. The other question is on the lead times and given the INR 75,000 crore of in the pipeline that CEO spoke about, what's the kind of lead time that one should expect if we are getting a transformer or a switchgear order currently? How do you see, given that we have seen like roughly 50% of the industry which used to be Chinese in the last cycle, which are, which is now gone, how could one think about profitability cycle as well?
I would say here, the bargain is that, yes, definitely, you know, that's good for the industry, but at one point of time, as you said, there was an underloading situation. The first and foremost, yes, it's going to improve the, you know, the utilization of the existing manufacturers. That is one thing. Second aspect, I would also say here is, the utilization also actually depends upon the requirement of the customers and also other market conditions as well. For example, when we talk about transformers, so even the new projects which are coming for TPB, so earlier it used to come with a timeline of about 15 months to, like, 12 months to 15 months. Now, that is also, I think, getting increased to 21 to 24 months.
I think on that side also, the regulators or the ABC companies are also understanding the pressure which is there. Accordingly, the deliveries also are also getting adjusted from the factory. Of course, if you are looking for a transformer today, say, in a 6 months or 8 months timeline, it is difficult. Why it is difficult? That it is not only your own manufacturing capacity, but you are also, to a great extent, dependent upon the component sourcing as well, where globally, you know, the sourcing times have increased, so whether it is electronics or whether it is all few high voltage items as well. But if you look at switchgear, I think for switchgears, the lead times are not that great. If somebody wants in few months, it is possible to do it.
Okay. This last question from my side. One of the, your peers, Australian Industry and the plant projects, they spoke about increased localization in HVDC, like the increasing on the valve side, and even on the GIS side, where they are saying that the coatings and some of the castings are being localized here, and one should see better cycle time and profitability. Is GE also kind of looking at some of these increased localization initiatives and which will eventually improve our profitability and recommendations?
Bhavin, for example, on GIS side, I would say that we were the first company to have set up a GIS plant in the country. Since the time we have set up the plant, there is a constant exercise which is being conducted by our team to do the localization. Then we identify component by component, and then we do a rigorous process of testing, and then qualify the local suppliers. Today, comfortably, we meet the Make in India requirement, which is there from our factory. Just to give you the confidence, the localization effort is an ongoing exercise which keeps on happening in the plant.
We keep on working to improve both the cost and also to ensure that the components are available in the country for us to reduce in terms of the lead times, in terms of the cost, in terms of other aspects as well.
Got you. Yeah, thank you so much for taking my questions.
Thank you very much.
Thank you, sir. A reminder to all the participants, if you wish to ask a question, you may press star 1 on your touchtone telephone. Anyone who wishes to ask a question, may press star 1 on your touchtone telephones. We take the next question from the line of Renu Baid from IIFL Securities. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, good evening, team. Congrats, Sandeep, for your new role. Hello?
Hi. Thank you, Renu. I, I think it's quite delayed, quite late now.
Yeah, yeah, that's more of a formal congratulations, so.
Thank you.
Yeah. Sandeep, my first question is, when we look at the export part of the business, some of the larger EPC companies, commentaries on the pipeline from Middle East, LATAM, and some of the other markets have been very, very strong. How are you looking at your export pipeline, both direct exports as well as business which comes through EPC contractors, looking like for the next 9 to 12 months? How does the pricing of the equipment today compare in these markets versus the domestic pricing that we have seen?
Renu, one thing, for example, when we talk about GE, we have a presence in all the markets. Of course, there are certain markets allocated on terms of product basis and on terms of project basis.
Mm-hmm.
Also, we have to see that in certain markets, whether the products of India are qualified or not. For example, when we look at MINAC and all, there the Indian products are not so qualified, they prefer to buy European products. Definitely today the share of export is increasing. Also, with the global demand increasing in Europe and US and other parts, we are getting a lot of, you know, traction happening from those markets also. There also we are engaging with our local team, or we are also engaging with we are also engaging directly with the customers for qualification of our product.
That's a constant area of focus for us, and you would have seen, as Sushil has presented the related party transaction for approval, where we have requested for a higher amount as compared to last year. That also shows our confidence to increase the export. That is one thing. Definitely, the export pricing is much better than domestic pricing, so there is no doubt about that.
Okay. On the same line, if you look at, especially Europe has, in the last two years, seen significant spurt in the HVDC orders and creating shortages of supplies. Has that situation relatively eased? Because, in directly or indirectly, it will also impact the supplies of these components to the Indian subcontinent, as and when the orders emerge. How is the better situation in that region for HVDC products?
It has not eased, and looking into the pipelines of various utilities there, I don't think that it is going to ease in the next five to seven years. This is what is today's forecast. I don't know what happens tomorrow, but today the generation company, they have a quite robust forecast for putting offshore wind projects, et cetera, not only in Europe but in US as well. That's going to drive the demand in a big way for HVDC projects globally.
In your view, will this also have an indirect impact on the pricing when we see domestic projects going up for bidding later this year?
100%.
Got it. Second, can you just share some update on some of the loss-making or the older projects like Essel? Overall, what has been the share of these old legacy loss-making or low-margin orders in the backlog today?
I will first part I will answer, and then second part, Sushil will answer. I think in one of the highlights which Abhishek presented, we have commissioned the part of the Essel project in the last quarter. At least that's a confidence what we can... That our part, we are part of the project we have already commissioned, and rest of it Sushil can...
Essel project is fully commissioned, and that's not in the backlog. On rest of the backlog, around 20%-25%.
... projects are with the low margin, the legacy old projects, where we had the commodity price impact. We expect that in next 3-4 quarters, they will phase out sequentially. Most of the new orders starting, say, April 2022 onwards, will get a healthy margin.
Sure. On the commercial closure of the SL, have all the price escalations are passed through whatever was expected, is it secured or something else could be expected on the closure of this project because of last year?
Whatever was there as per the contract, is definitely we don't have an outstanding or like a past due with the customer today.
Got it. Lastly, while this entire new vertical of Vernova has been created at the group level, what is the thought process of bringing any strategic investor, or how is the group looking at this separate vertical in terms of focus and growth strategy?
Really, this is basically being dealt at global corporate level, where, where we are not involved in any fashion. We are not. We don't have any idea to answer this question.
Done. Thanks much, and all the best, sir. Thank you.
Thank you, Renu.
Thank you. We take the next question from the line of Mohit Kumar from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead, sir.
Yes, thanks for the opportunity once again. My first question is: What are the capabilities you would like to build over the next three years? Are there any significant gaps in your suite of products, which can cater to the transmission opportunity, opportunities available in this country?
I think, I would say, Mohit, that, yes, definitely we have good capability across board. For example, we have transformers, circuit breakers, GIS, instrument transformers, automation, digital compute platform. Yes, in some pockets we definitely have some uncompetitive issues, maybe a legacy product and things like that. That's a constant exercise which we keep on doing based on market feedback and all, to bring new generation of products to for the R&D to be pushed to develop products which are more competitive or maybe which can give a better, you know, commercial advantage to the customer, even if it is priced bit higher. This is a constant exercise what we keep on doing.
Just to give you a sense that 95% of the product what is manufactured by GE Grid Solutions globally is manufactured by GE India itself, GE India itself.
How do you compare with the rest of the GE factories in the GE virtually entire portfolio? How do you compare ourselves on cost competitiveness across the world?
When I compare myself to other GE factories, definitely in terms of cost, we have a good advantage. This is all what I can say.
My third question: What is your localization level in HVDC, GIS and STATCOMs?
What do you mean?
Your localization % in HVDC, GIS and STATCOM, rather ballpark numbers?
The GIS will be like, I would take it as. It will depend upon range to range, but it will be like more than 70%, something like that. It will be in the range of about 70%. Then there is an ongoing exercise to even improve it as well. For HVDC, just to give you, that we were the first manufacturer, 800 kV HVDC transformer. We were the first manufacturer in India to have manufactured an 800 kV HVDC transformer from Vadodara. For CTLT, we have supplied our valve also from India. Decent amount. STATCOM, we have not done any project in India. It is similar to HVDC, except for a few different components. There also, again, transformers, etc., can be manufactured in our Vadodara plant.
For the other IGBTs, et cetera, we still need to see about the localization part.
My last question is: How are you trying to avoid the legacy issues which cropped up in the past and which hurt our margins?
There is. Two, three things I will say here. One, we have been repeatedly saying. First will be selectivity. We thoroughly analyze that what kind of project, with what composition of product we have to go after. That is one thing. Second, what are the commercial terms and conditions? That is also plays an important role, including the cash flow. Third, instead of, you know, running after market share and revenue, we are today focused more on profitability. These three focus is very religiously practiced by the commercial team in all the new orders what we are getting.
Understood, sir. Thank you. Understood, sir. Thank you.
Thank you, Mohit.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to ask a question, you may press star and one. We take the next question from the line of Mr. Umesh Rao from PhillipCapital. Please go ahead, sir.
Hello, sir. Sir, I have one question related to employee cost. I think we have done significant cost acceleration around employee cost in fiscal year 2023, and now also in first quarter, there is a decline in employee cost on a year-on-year basis. Do you feel this is more of sustainable now?
Yes, it is. There will be slight increase, but we continue, which is because of the annual inflation and so on. We continue to optimize the Lean and other improvement initiatives. Let's say the last year number, which is INR 3,500 million of employee costs, this year number should be lower than that.
Got it, sir. Any forex loss or gain that was there during the quarter?
Yeah. Most of the other income as we see in the quarter is related to the forex gain. However, I'll add that half of this, almost 40%-50% of this, is actually the realized gain.
Got it, sir. Thank you so much.
Thank you, sir. A reminder to all the participants, if you wish to ask a question, you may press star and one on your touchtone telephone. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one. We'll take the next question from the line of Bhavin Vithlani from SBI Mutual Fund. Please go ahead, sir.
Yeah, thank you for the follow-up opportunity. So Sabir, one feedback that we've been getting from speaking to your peers is about on the HVDC side, re-respect to the gap in the technology, specifically in the HVDC Light, the technology in which leh Ladakh is going to be built. That's one, and second is on the STATCOM side, that GE completely lacks the STATCOM technology, so they might kind of miss out on that. If you could throw light on these two things?
Two things here, I think, Bhavin. One is that if you would have been following GE Grid Solutions in or maybe in the, maybe on LinkedIn or in fact, if you would have seen the global results as well. This year, GE has taken, this year, means from January till now, GE has taken close to, I think, about 12-13 HVDC contracts globally. This is just to give you that, we are not looking at any gap in the HVDC technology. Of course, leh Ladakh is, you know, a different strategic project, which will require a lot of other aspects apart from HVDC to execute that. That is a decision what we have to take. That is one thing.
About STATCOM also, this is one thing I can say is that, for example, there is a recent STATCOM which was connected with the English Channel, which has been commissioned. There are other global STATCOM projects also and large STATCOM projects also globally, which we have commissioned. I will not forget that we have a technology gap, but then we are focused in STATCOM market selectively. We have not taken any order in India till now, but it doesn't mean that it is not our target to take the order in future as well.
Just a follow-up here. Would we need the type testing and all that could perhaps act as the orders from STATCOM complete in it?
The type testing of what?
The type testing of the Indian facilities for the STATCOM, given the localization content requirement.
That is what I'm saying, that, for example, STATCOM will have some 2, 3 important components. For example, when I look at transformer, the transformer we manufacture in India day in, day out. There whenever the transformer goes out, it, it goes through a process of type test. You know, the STATCOM transformers are much simpler to make than a HVDC transformer in terms of complexity. It's not a big concern to supply STATCOM transformers from Baroda.
Okay. Yeah, that answers my question. Thank you so much for taking my questions.
Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, that was the last question for the day. I would now like to hand the conference over to Ms. Tanvi Gupta for closing comments.
Thanks, Sia. Thank you all for joining us today for the GE T&D India Limited earnings call. We hope the insights provided by all our speakers have been informative and valuable to you. We value the trust and support of all our investors and analysts, and we ensure to remain committed to maintain transparent communication and fostering strong relationships. If you have any further questions or require any additional information, please do not hesitate to reach out to me or The email IDs available on our company website. Once again, thank you for participating in today's call. We look forward to your continuous support as we embark on our exciting journey ahead. Thank you. Thanks, everyone.
Thank you. On behalf of GE T&D India Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines.