Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to GE T&D India Limited second quarter ending 30 September 2021 for FY 2021-22. 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 Mr. Suneel Mishra, Head of Investor Relations, GE T&D India Limited. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Thank you, Rutuja. Good day to all of you. I would like to take this opportunity to convey you season's greetings. Welcome to today's conference call with the GE T&D India Limited management team here. As we know, this conference call has been organized to present and discuss financial results for the second quarter of the financial year ending 31 March 2022. Now let me first introduce my management team available on this call. We have with us Mr. Pitamber Shivnani, who is the Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer. We have with us Mr. Sushil Kumar, who has been recently elevated as Whole-Time director, and he is CFO as well. We have with us Mr. Nagesh Tilwani, who is our products business leader. Mr. Sandeep Zanzaria, who is our commercial leader. We have with us Mr.
Marias undaram Antony, who is our project business leader. We have also with us Mr. Manoj Prasad Singh, who is the company secretary, and we have Mr. Anshul Madaan available on this call, who is our communications leader. Please note that this conference call is scheduled up to 4 P.M. I hope you would have received the investor or analyst presentation, and the same has been uploaded on our website. I hope you have also read the disclaimer as per slide number 2. I would now request Mr. Pitamber Shivnani to begin this conference call highlighting key events of the quarter. Mr. Maria and Mr. Nagesh Tilwani will update us on operations and factories. Thereafter, Mr. Sandeep Zanzaria will take us through the market. Lastly, Mr. Sushil Kumar will give us his insights on financials. I would now invite Mr. Shivnani to begin this conference call with his opening remarks.
Over to Mr. Shivnani.
Thank you, Suneel. Ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon. Thanks for joining the call. We hope you and your families are healthy and safe. I would like to start this call by giving you a brief overview about the last quarter and then would request the other colleagues to present in the call the details. Before we update you on Quarter Two results, I would like to share with you a couple of announcements. First is about the appointment of Rajendra Sheshadri Iyer on the board as a director with effect from October 1, 2021. Rajendra is the Managing Director of GE Grid Solutions Global Business Unit, Grid Integration since October 2017. He's based out of London. He has almost three decades of expertise in HVDC, high voltage DC transmission and project engineering, coupled with an international management experience.
The board has also appointed Sushil Kumar, currently CFO of GE T&D India Limited, as a Whole-Time Director and CFO with effect from January 1, 2022. Sushil has a rich experience of 21 years working with organizations like GE, Alstom, Areva and Schneider Electric. He has been working with the company for past 12 years and has held responsibilities in various finance domains, including Chief Financial Officer, Commercial Finance, Turnkey Business, Strategy and Business Planning. We are delighted to have both these gentlemen join GTDIL board. They bring wealth of experience and deep knowledge from leading diverse set of business. I would also like to express my sincere gratitude to Emanuel Bertolini and Gaurav Negi, who resigned from the board of directors of the company with effect from October 1, 2021 and November 1, 2021, respectively.
Their able leadership and wise counsel has always been highly appreciated by all the members of the board. Coming back to update on Q2 financial year 2021-22, during the quarter, we continued to operate with full rigor. However, the team had to navigate through a challenging operating environment, including continued supply chain disruption, commodity inflation, and continued market pressure. Our teams are working diligently to manage these challenges by actively dual sourcing, qualifying alternative parts redesign, and re-qualifying product configuration and expanding factory capacity. During the quarter, our team commissioned important projects for state utilities as well as private players. This includes commissioning of critical projects of UPPCL, DVC, and Kerala State Electricity Board. My colleague, Marias undaram, will give the operation update in detail later in the call.
As I mentioned in the last quarter call, our biggest priority now is the growth in orders, and we are improving our team abilities to market, sell, and service the products we have today. Our order booking in quarter 2 of financial year 2021-22 was INR 6.3 billion, up 18% compared to INR 5.4 billion in quarter ended September 2020. Though Sandeep will talk about orders in detail, but let me highlight one of them here, which is related to our continued expansion in our neighboring countries. After the 400 kV gas-insulated substation order that we received in Nepal in quarter 4 of last financial year, we have now received multiple contracts from Bhutan Power Corporation to build four gas-insulated substations in Bhutan on turnkey basis.
This is our second big order from the neighboring countries after Nepal, and it is a testimony of our technological prowess and strong delivery capabilities. Besides, we have also received $4.2 million order for design, supply, erection, testing of 220 kV GIS equipment for 9-bay substation at Senegal in West Africa, which further strengthens our exports. Q2 has been a challenging quarter as everyone has been put to the test by the commodity inflation and continuing supply chain disruptions and hence the same has impacted our financials as well. Sushil will cover the financial aspects. We continue to use Lean to improve our operation and our cost structure. We recently organized a week-long Kaizen event at our plants at Padappai, Pallavaram and Vadodara. All the leaders, including me, were personally present at the plant to boost the morale of the teams.
Numerous Kaizens were undertaken during the week, and we achieved significant outcome in terms of measures that will help us deliver sustainable Lean initiative over a long term to improve safety, quality, delivery and cost. My colleague Nagesh will take you through the key outcomes of the event shortly. COVID-19 has altered the world, but it hasn't stopped the steady march of renewable. In fact, during the pandemic, the segment grew faster than in past. The world added more than 260 GW of renewable energy in 2020, up nearly 50% from the previous year. According to the International Renewable Energy Agency, more than 80% of new electricity capacity added last year was renewable, with solar and wind accounting for 91% of new renewable.
This is good news for the planet, but the energy transition to low carbon sources of electricity involves much more than building new wind and solar farms. It is evident from the outcome of the recently held COP26 summit that immediate action is necessary to achieve climate change mitigation goals and address the energy trilemma of affordable, reliable and sustainable energy. During the summit, India announced a bold target of achieving carbon neutrality by 2070, including production of half of the electricity from renewable resources by 2030. The government also raised the non-fossil fuel target by announcing 500 GW of non-fossil electricity capacity by 2030 as against 450 GW that was committed earlier. This requires the integration of more renewables into the grid and will undoubtedly bring more investments to India's renewable sector and associated grid infrastructure.
We are closely tracking these opportunities and stay committed to accelerate India's as well as South Asia's energy transition to a clean energy future, and in the process enable a better and cleaner world. With that, I will request now Marias undaram to provide future insights on the operation during the quarter. Over to you, Maria.
Thank you. Thank you, Pitamber. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. It is my pleasure to really update you on some of the key commissioning which we have done in line with our purpose of creating the grid of the future and accelerating the energy transition with advanced grid technologies. Some of the key commissioning which we did during the quarter two, I would like to highlight was one which you see on the top left, which is a UPPCL Hardoi Road.
This was a very critical one for the state. We actually delivered the entire substation in terms of commissioning the eight 400 kV bays, four 220 kV bays, and five 132 kV bays of GIS, and then two 500 MVA ICTs, and along with one 63 MVAR bus reactor in the last quarter. It was a critical one because this was crucial for the overall state in terms of their modernization plan, grid modernization plan. Then I would also like to highlight the one around the
Sorry to interrupt you, sir, but we cannot hear you. Your voice is breaking in between. Can you please check?
One second, ma'am. Is it okay now?
Yes, sir. Please go ahead.
Okay. I think, should I repeat, start again?
No. It was just like 3 seconds prior.
Okay. Let me continue, I think. Sorry for the you know short disruption there. I also want to highlight the work which we are doing in Bikaner, which has been one of the big solar parks in the country. We actually commissioned two substations. One Saur Urja in Bikaner as well as for Adani in BKTL, Bikaner-Khetri. These were vital for the overall solar park, solar power generation there. This was something which was done in quarter two. Definitely we continue to increase our contribution in that area, in that region, part of the region for India.
Then we also actually, on the eastern part of the country, for Dhanbad, NKT in Dhanbad, we actually commissioned the substation there, which was around four AIS bays in Dhanbad. As well as in the southern part of the country in KSEB, we continue to make our in KSEB, on this quarter, Punnathur, which is KSEB. This is part of our overall package one and package four implementations, which we have been doing with KSEB customer. Finally at DVC we had Burdwan in West Bengal. We also delivered on the substation in Burdwan. We are definitely excited to continue our focus and operations in terms of enabling the energy transition.
We are progressing well in some of the neighboring countries like Nepal, where we have significant amount of execution going on. We will be definitely starting our execution in Bhutan as well, continuing our work, which we have done already, and then focusing on the new orders as well. With that, I would definitely like to give the mic to my colleague, Nagesh, who will update us on the President's Lean Week, which we did in the month of October. Over to you, Nagesh.
Thanks, Maria. Good afternoon, all. This is Nagesh. I will just take you through maybe two major updates. One on the spotlight on Pallavaram, our flagship relay commission plant, which is operational from 1958, one of the oldest plant in GE. Largely catering to the global markets, including domestic Asia markets. One of the largest unit for the relay manufacturing. We are having a very strong export footprint, exporting the relays and intelligent devices to 60 more countries from India. A very strong commitment towards health and safety. Over 20 million man-days without lost time accidents. That's a site commitment for the safety of the employees.
We are the frontrunner among the first in terms of starting the relay manufacturing in the country, as well as on the control and engineered solution, which is control and relay panel, to serve with a legacy install base of over 60 years plus. Our takt time, that means, is about half a minute. That means every one minute we produce two relays to serve the country and to the global markets. We are the first in terms of an introduction of digital technology, center of excellence for the IEC 61850 protocols, and having a legacy of install base of digital substation and digital base in the country, over 300 substations which are run today on our substation automation systems and the protection controls.
That's a spotlight zoom on Pallavaram. Followed by that, as Mr. Pitamber explained, we had a very eventful week, Kaizen President Week, where three of our plants were engaged in lean initiatives on Pallavaram, Padappai, and transformer units. All the three plants, the leadership team was present to work on the shop floor with the teams, with the manufacturing team, with the industrialization team, to have lean initiatives and to get immediate benefits and turnaround of the activities. Zoom on Padappai, where we have worked on a mechanism drives, ME drives is what we call it, which is a global line where we were doing about $3 million of revenue in 2022. The event was to identify few of the actions which will help us to reduce the lead times.
The current lead time was 18 days. With the lean initiatives we have, we are crashing the lead time to 2 days. There was a specific focus on ergonomics and overall movement of the goods, which is the strategic movement of the material, movement of the activities that was also considerably reduced. You can see 90% reduction on the lead times and on travel times, about 13% reduction, which was achieved in the 4.5 days of workshop. If I specifically Mr. Parag, Mr. Pitamber was also physically present for engaging with the teams. On the similar event, similar timeframe, we have done at Pallavaram, where the focus was on the store side.
We are doing about 100+ substation projects, and the visual management and the store handling was addressed during the Lean actions. The important outcome was 15% space optimization, ergonomic improvement in the 44%, and kitting cycle time, which is another critical item, about 45% reduction in the kitting cycle time. Similar event was conducted in PTR in Baroda factory, where the focus was on 1,055 kV single phase shunt reactor transformers. The important zone was on how we improvise on how we standardize and improvise our material kitting system. Out of the 10 Kaizens identified, ergonomically we reduced 75% reduction in the replenishment lead times. The leakage was down by 50%.
The spaghetti movement has helped us to get about 45% average reduction in terms of across all the sections. That's the key achievement I would say on all the three plants, and this was. The similar event was run across the globe on other units of the grid as well, and three of the plants were selected from India for doing these initiatives. With that, I hand over to Sandeep for covering the commercial piece.
Thank you, Nagesh, and good afternoon, everyone. Order intake for the quarter, we have booked orders worth INR 635 crore. Primarily coming from Bhutan, where we won good order to build four GIS substations with the highest voltage of 220 kV. Apart from that, continuing our success in Power Grid, we have taken further orders for 765 kV, which is part of the evacuation of the renewable projects which are being implemented in Rajasthan. Also, we have taken a substantial and a good service order on our installed base of Sardar Sarovar for the 400 kV GIS. There we will be doing the M4 maintenance which is required after some years of service, which is defined as per the product requirements.
Apart from that, we have taken a big order for supplying 145 kV GIS to Power Grid for Arunachal and Manipur project through Siddharth Engineering. We have taken GIS orders of 245 kV for Gandhinagar from Torrent Power. This quarter we have improved our order intake as compared to last year by about 18%. When we look at H1, we have improved the order intake by 12.5%. There is an uptick in the market after we have seen the impact of COVID, at least in the first quarter this year. Now the market is slowly recovering. Now I'll hand over to Sushil to take it from this point.
Thanks. Good afternoon, everyone. We are on page number 9 of the presentation on the financials. As Pitamber explained in the beginning, we had an underperformance in the quarter because of the unprecedented run in the commodity and the supply chain issues. Overall, we had revenue of INR 8,517 million for the quarter, which was almost in line with last year, about INR 200 million short than last year. On similar lines, on a full half-year basis, we had INR 14.8 billion of revenue compared to INR 15.1 billion. Again, about INR 300 million short than last year.
However, on the EBITDA front, the EBITDA was for the quarter about INR 200 million approximately compared to INR 428 million in the last year. There was a shortfall of more than INR 200 million for the quarter, and similar impact on the profit before tax. You see the P&L, our gross profit was impacted because of the commodity price increase that we had to absorb, the recent surge in the last 6-9 months to more than 30%-40% average across the world. Overall for the quarter, we have to take a hit of about 3% of the revenue or approximately more than INR 250 million of the commodity price impact in the cost of goods sold.
That was one major reason. The other major reason, if you look at the finance cost, the finance cost had increased compared to last year by about approximately INR 90 million-INR 100 million. This had two, three factors. One was the head count rationalization for which additional cost was incurred. The second was one-time home office setup allowed to the employees who are working remotely or on a hybrid basis, and other smaller factors increasing the cost.
These two factors of commodity price and logistics cost absorption, along with the increased employee cost, resulted into a lower EBITDA and profit, or loss before tax performance versus the last quarter, as well as the similar impact on the half year basis. On the cash front, during the first six months, at April to September, we had about INR 350 million of net cash outflow, and our debt increased, to that extent in the six-month period. For the quarter, the net debt increased by about INR 600 million. The first quarter was positive for us. End of September, our net debt was INR 1,966 million. Moving to the next page, which is a detail on the order and revenue split into export and domestic market.
For the quarter, our 48% of the orders came from the export segment. On a half yearly basis, 43% of the orders were from the export and rest were domestic. On the revenue side, as we have been discussing since last fiscal quarter, most of the increase or growth in the order we are getting in export, but there is always a lag time when it catches up in the revenue. For the quarter, revenues were 25% from export and 75% from the domestic side. Orders in hand end of September 2021, 63% of the orders are coming from the private sector. The backlog, sorry, rather the backlog is from the private segment.
18% of the backlog is from the state utilities, and 19% of the backlog is from the central utility and the central PSU. With this, we'll now open up for the questions.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on the 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 Renu Baid from IIFL. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hi. Good afternoon. My first question is to understand on the profitability side. You did mention that almost 3% of sales was a hit because of commodities in the current quarter. Can you help us understand what percentage of the backlog has been impacted by these inflationary headwinds, in from steel and CRGO for our portfolio? And is it fully covered in terms of cost to completion of provisions, or one can anticipate some of these provisions to continue in the second half, as execution ramps up?
See the way the accounting policies work and the way the provisioning is done, and also, you know, we apply these for the cost to completion. All the anticipated charges or cost to complete are considered by the end of every quarter. However, as you see that the commodity prices and the logistics cost plus supply chain disruptions, they're quite dynamic at present.
Correct.
If there is further, you know, disruptions or further commodity changes, it may impact also. As of now, it has been fully considered in the AC. Also it depends on the timing of the placement of the orders or negotiation or finalization of negotiation and shipment versus the volatility in the market. These market volatilities are difficult to predict. From our side as a management, we have internal efforts to renegotiate prices wherever possible with the private segment customers. We have the action plans to negotiate the prices backwards with the suppliers and make sure that we make savings in all other areas to offset this kind of commodity price or the impact on the backlog.
Sir, basically, when we are expecting execution to ramp up in the second half, especially from certain fixed price projects, which we had won, towards the end of last fiscal, should we expect margins to improve, given the fact that provisions have already been created or probably these orders would be broadly, like margin neutral or we'll continue to have headwinds in terms of gross margins, when we recognize them in revenues?
See, we have INR 4,100 crore of backlog.
Mm-hmm.
Everything is not fully ordered to the suppliers, but we have considered all the costs to complete based on the current prices. Depending on the execution timeline, the pricing is done. As of today, we have factored in everything, but tomorrow if the prices go down and we have a better timing of placement of orders, we will gain. If prices go up and we place the orders to the supplier or execute in that timeframe, any further changes in the commodity prices or logistics costs or any further disruption in the supply chain, those are the factors which are beyond the control of the management and may impact positively or negatively.
Sure. Secondly, if you look at the competitive environment, in terms of both the product portfolio for transformers, GIS products and projects, are we seeing that the restrictions in terms of Chinese competitors and the bids from the product customers are actually now in favor of suppliers like us in terms of pricing or how is the demand supply dynamics in competitive outlook across the products and the project portfolio for us?
If you ask from me, demand supply is still the supply. Basically, there is a gap in spite of Chinese being debarred from quoting the border country. It's still there a more on a supply side, demand is less. Obviously the prices have become to some extent, I will say in some of the equipment stable actually.
Okay. Got it. Should we anticipate that when demand momentum picks up in terms of new order flow inquiries, the gross margins on the backlogs should start improving now, in your view?
No gross margins from the order backlog will not improve. Like you take an example of variable orders. Variable orders, we don't book the material actually. That will be as it is. Firm orders, if the commodity prices go down, then we can get the advantage. If they go up, then what Sushil said, we may get the hit also.
Just to add on, I think the point is whether we are considering, because in a competitive scenario, we, every supplier is expected to behave rationally and include the current costing in the new bid.
Right.
If there is a competitive scenario, obviously industry gives a particular gross margin, say 25%-30%, depending on the cost structure of every supplier. We have been including the current costing in the new bid, and we need at a margin that we expect to earn prior to this commodity price surge. This is something that we have been doing. Again, as I said, the future commodity price increase. Now, if today we say that, say copper 30% higher than six months ago, and tomorrow if copper becomes, and that's our current costing, if copper becomes further 10% higher and it's a firm price tender, so that may impact. If copper goes down as an example, the non-firm price orders we expect to gain.
However, one of the endeavor, as I also said, is to have more and more variable price contracts if possible, and to also renegotiate when the unprecedented events were not anticipated by both us as a supplier and the customer also.
Sure. Understand that. Broadly, if you look at the market environment as in we were expecting inflow momentum to pick in the second half with acceleration in project awards and tendering from the state as well as certain TBCB-based projects. Because until now exports has led the inflows for us. How are we looking the demand momentum for the rest of the year, especially from the domestic market improving?
Really just for the TBCB, yes, we expect that a lot of decisions to be taken from now to March. There's a good pipeline of TBCB projects which are expected. That way the demand for the domestic will definitely come up. Only thing is that in the state sector we are still not seeing the demand getting picked up. States are in a lag in terms of investment on the transmission side. That's yes, definitely a negative for the sector. TBCB, there are going to be about 8-10 projects which are going to get decided from now till in the time, now to March time.
Sure. I have few more questions. I'll come back in the queue. Thanks, and appreciate the better disclosures in the presentations which have been done this time on exports, domestic and the mix of order backlog.
Thanks.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Bhavin Vithlani from SBI Mutual Fund. Please go ahead.
Thank you for the opportunity. Just continuing on the question on gross margins and on a sustainable basis, and if one takes a 2-3-year picture and based on the bidding that we are currently submitting and winning orders. Back in history, we had our gross margins used to vary between 30%-35%. Do you see a chance of that coming back over the next 2 years, or that's ruled out given the demand supply economics that you highlighted?
Bhavin, earlier when you are referring to 30-35% of gross margin, that was when we were executing Champa-Kurukshetra HVDC project, which was a high margin deal. If you consider last two financial year, which did not really had a significant Champa execution. In the financial year 2019-20, we had a gross margin of approximately 28%, and in the last financial year we had a gross margin of 26.5%. In the current half year, H1, despite absorbing the impact of commodities, because we also worked on lean and kaizen events that the team explained, we earned still a margin of 29%. Without COVID, I think 28-30, that is a range where we expect that, you know, margins continue given the competitive pressure in the industry.
However, as we have been explaining in last many calls, that there are a lot of internal efficiency and Lean actions being taken. They were normally supposed to give better profitability or improvement in the cost or cost of goods sold, but that has been unfortunately offset by the unprecedented market events of commodity pricing risk. As of now, 28%-29%, that's the range probably where we can continue for the timing.
Sure, that is very helpful. We had taken an approval from the shareholders on the majority of minority with respect to related party on bidding of some of the large HVDC orders. Could you give us an outlook on the HVDC orders that we are expecting, say, over the next 2-3 years and what, if any, broad timeline on when these projects could be awarded? That will be helpful.
I think, Bhavin, if we primarily see there are about 4 or 5 HVDC tenders. What I would not put the word tenders, but prospects which are there on the horizon. One is the Adani one, which is still under discussion with Adani, so that's in the tendering phase. Apart from that, yes, the Leh-Ladakh and the Transmission Planning Committee has also approved our proposed two of the HVDCs, one going from Bhadla to UP and one going from Khavda to Indore. These are basically in the prospective stage where the studies are being done by the government, et cetera.
Even if this comes, then, we are looking at, apart from the Adani one, earliest would be, I would put my bet upon, one year from now would be the right time when, the first tender would see the light of the day. Looking into the complex process of the size of the HVDC project, even if the first tender comes after a year, then putting a bid, et cetera, that means we are looking at the, at minimum about 6-8 months decision timeline from there. Practically, the next-to-next financial year would be apart from the Adani, we can see the first decision of HVDC to come in.
Sure thing. That is helpful. Last bit is, yeah, even in the previous call you had highlighted the target is to take the exports to 30%, and we have seen in the first two quarters, export has actually been considerably higher than that. On a long-term sustainable basis, where do we see a share of exports in the revenues or orders? If you could also just give a color in terms of how different the profitability for the export market versus the India market is .
I think, Bhavin, just to give an, the answer here is that for example, when we compare, for example, Bhutan, Nepal, of course, these are exports, but probably the geography, competition, et cetera, remains the same. The margins are not as high as when you compare it with the product export orders which goes to, for example, either Africa or the East Asia Pacific and these types of things . With the Indian market now picking up, we expect at least the share of export orders to drop. Because, for example, when we look at last quarter, not many decisions were taken in India. With Bhutan coming in, suddenly you see Bhutan, Nepal, and when these come in, it skews the ratio of exports which you are seeing here.
It's like an extension of the Indian landscape in the neighboring countries. I think that primarily the question which you are asking is that the high margin export profile of 30% when we will be able to reach. I think that should be possible somewhere maybe around 2 years down the line. Primarily because even the other markets also needs to pick up. Today we are not seeing much of the market picking up in Africa and other places as well after the COVID. Unless and until those don't pick up, yes, definitely there is pressure. Just to add on, Bhavin, it's very difficult to lay out a number or in terms of percentage how it splits between domestic and export orders. Because obviously order will depend on the winning in the market, which has many, many dynamics.
What we, you know, talked about earlier, few quarters earlier and regularly that we want to focus on rate of exports. That's what has happened and we have demonstrated. We want to win more and more in both the markets, export as well as domestic. To the point that Sandip explained, the focus is also to increase export from factories because that product export helps in the better margin. Even if we do the export for projects in the neighboring countries, those are many a times World Bank, ADB funded tenders, and we do not face as many challenges as in the domestic market related to payment term and the project delivery. Those are benefits of doing projects in the neighboring country. As I said, we want to maximize our order book in both the markets.
Sure. Just last question from my side. Our parent GE announced a reorganization of the company into three parts. How would that impact GE T&D?
You see, GE has announced its plan to combine GE Renewable Energy, GE Power, and GE Digital into one business positioned to lead the energy transition. The purpose to spin off this business in early 2024. GE T&D India Limited continues to be a part of GE Renewable Energy business. As of now, we do not expect any impact. It will be business as usual for us. We will keep you posted with the updates as and when they happen.
Okay. Thank you so much for taking the questions.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Kashyap from Theleme Partners. Please go ahead.
Hi, I have a couple of questions, and pardon me if they are a bit basic. I'm slightly new to the business compared to the gents earlier. My question is specifically for Mr. Pitamber, and I was kind of going through his track record, you know, as to how ABB evolved under his leadership, or at least the vertical that he was managing. It's quite encouraging to see the margin and the return on capital employed of the trajectory moving up. As investors, broadly, while we understand his agency, but what is disappointing is that in the last few years, the revenues have really not gone anywhere. If you look at net worth in the balance sheet, that broadly remains static.
Obviously, profits have really come up. What I want to understand from Mr. Pitamber is how he sees the business three, four years out, especially in terms of path to profitability and return on equity. At the end of the day, as investors, what we really care about is not just the execution capability, but at the end of the day, what it makes sense of the financial numbers. Unless it's really accretive in terms of revenue growth, in terms of execution showing up from where you are at INR 3,500-odd crores to INR 5,000 crores and profits coming back and return on equity in double digits is really, you know, obviously good, but it doesn't really add much value. Could you just explain how one should look at the business three to four years out?
You see, as far as my perspective is concerned, we have four large factories actually, and we have enough capacity. Unfortunately, last two years, because of COVID situation, the order intake has been down. As far as production capabilities, project execution capabilities, there is no doubt. Once like TBCB now market is going to come up, and when opportunities come up, when our order intake increases, we can definitely churn out more and earn the more profitability and take the more juice of the fixed effects actually. In times to come, the situation should improve actually in another one year's time also.
Just one further question. You know, there was some discussion on margin profile earlier, and I think broadly the thought process was that if the commodity prices come down, then we'll gain, and if it goes up, it goes against us. I'm not. You know, what I'm really interested, if you can explain, is how we can structurally change the character from our own efforts. See, what the external environment does is different, but what managerial capability you know stands out for is how we can manage to do much better than what the external environment deals at hand.
What would be really interesting is if we can kind of take the gross margins up over time through a mix of better execution in, you know, in terms of either cost efficiencies or like, the buyer was saying about scaling up exports. Could you know, give us some trajectory how we look at it? I understand you didn't want to share a perfect number on gross margins or, you know, you might not want to give a financial number to it. But can you give us, how we should look at it? Or should we be only reliant on external environment and our gross margin remain where they are at 20% or 30%?
Should we look at the business that way long term, or should we kind of build in an improvement which actually flows in because of management intensity?
You see, if you see our last year result, end of March, we made good amount of profit. Now, unfortunately, this commodity price increase, which was not foreseen. We have two buckets of orders. One is variable contracts, where we are fully protected. Another is basically firm contracts. In firm contracts, we have assumed certain escalation factors, and then the increase has been more than that. There, sometimes you get the hit. Obviously, in times to come, once if the commodity prices go really down, we may get the advantage, but it is very difficult to predict the future of commodities like CRGO and copper as on date actually.
How much of the-
As far as operation is concerned, we are concentrating a lot on Kaizen lean concept so as to take more juice and more productivity. The productivity in all our factories has enhanced quite around 15%-20% actually.
Assuming raw material prices stay where they are at this point, hypothetically, I know it's not a real world situation, they are always fluctuating. Hypothetically, if they were to remain constant, over a three-year window, given the Kaizen lean initiative and scale-up of exports, would it be fair to assume that the margin, at the gross margin level, you will see a gradual improvement, sustainably? Would that be a fair assumption?
See, yeah, it is a fair assumption, but we don't give a forward-looking statement actually. We feel if the prices remain as it is, and now we are more taking into cognizance the material cost increase in firm price contracts, so the situation should definitely improve.
Understood. How much of our total orders that we have booked, how much of that would be passed through, like you mentioned, and how much is where we are kind of stuck with fixed price? Could you share that breakdown, please?
Don't have that readily available. Maybe we can cover that in the next investor call.
Okay. Thank you. All the best.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Renu Baid from IIFL. Please go ahead.
Just to follow up from my side, has there been any FX gain or loss in the particular quarter given that other expenses seem to be a bit softer? Any gain which has come through in this particular quarter for us?
Just a moment. During the H1, we had a gain of about INR 10 crore in the other expenses.
Okay. Would it be broadly in the second quarter or?
The first quarter, as we said, was a loss and this quarter was a gain, and net result is INR 10 crore gain in the H1.
Sure. Got it. Secondly, broadly as in until last quarter we had seen multiple execution related headwinds along with supply chain which had impacted revenue booking across various domestic projects. Have we now started seeing those headwinds easing out? Any comments in terms of how are customers looking at execution timelines? Are we seeing material acceleration or fast track of projects?
You see, there are, Renu, some projects like which PGCIL and other utilities have land issues, so those are getting delayed. Because of that, there is a delay in lifting of equipment also on that front, actually.
Okay. Otherwise, in general, whatever lag we had seen because of the COVID second wave, is that now catching up? Should we see that being compensated in the second half or fourth quarter?
Yeah, yeah, that is catching up. The situation is improving. I will give you an example. Like our Essel order, Warangal, which was jeopardized, but now Adani has taken over, and he converted the order and he released all our pending payments also, and we are executing it well. Those things are moving fast, actually.
Okay. Get it. Right. Broadly, from the perspective on the export side, are we looking at any new market which could open up, especially in the Middle East, African bucket or South Asian markets, for some of our products, in the global supply chain picture?
No. We are definitely getting some market allocation from our global factory. There is some restructuring in the European factory, like what Nagesh presented, we will be starting the drive ME4, and that will add $3 million business additional for Padappai in 2022. Similarly, more allocations are coming, like instrument transformer and also the drives for the GIS and other things.
Get it. Right. Thanks, sir. This is pretty helpful. Thank you and all the best.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Jigar Shroff from Financial Research. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thank you for taking my question. Sir, if you could shed some light on this global grid plan, One Sun One World One Grid talk that is going on. I mean, what could be the size, the opportunity? I mean, if you could have some study or something on it. How could it be profitable, beneficial to us in terms of order intakes? Thank you.
Jigar, hi. I think that's a bit long-term today to talk about numbers because this project is being talked about on the conceptual basis as of now. For example, the installed base. Suppose if you build a big installed base of power generating capacity, and then if you are able to connect it to the different parts of the world, for example maybe through a cable to Middle East and also through transmission lines connectivity towards the east. Then depending upon that, if you are generating them in some part of the world, you will still be having peak demand. In some other parts you will be having the low demand time, et cetera.
This is basically the concept on that, but it is still on the drawing board and today it is not possible for us to convert it into the numbers, et cetera, because there is no concrete, for example, this much capacity for this country and things like that. Once that comes into picture on the drawing board, then the numbers can be put in.
What have you been hearing in terms of, I mean, are there some deadlines have been fixed? I mean, say in the next 6 months, 12 months, I mean, because it's a coalition of countries getting together. I mean, if you could shed some light on that.
No, that's what I'm saying.
Yeah.
Because it's on the drawing board today, no timelines basically because there were the multiple issues in terms of, for example, the connectivity with the country, also the load based scenarios in each country and generation. Many things are to be seen and then it will also require the political engagement as well. I am not seeing that in terms of hard convertibility, at least for next 2-3 years, I am not sure on that part.
Okay. Thank you so much.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Bhavin Vithlani from SBI Mutual Fund. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thank you for the opportunity again. Just one question. In our presentation, we have mentioned a lot of emphasis on Lean manufacturing and Kaizen and 90% improvement in manufacturing lead times in some of the product lines. A hypothetical question, had the commodity inflation not been there, the initiatives we have taken on Lean manufacturing and operational efficiency, what would have been the benefit of these on the financial terms, maybe 1%, 2%, 3% of revenues? If you could just tell that.
You see, if the commodity prices would have not increased, we would have definitely gained out of the productivity, higher productivity and these Lean and other concepts. We generally do not give forward-looking statement on these things; how much will be the increase. It is very difficult to say. That is why let us see going forward, if there is a downtrend in the commodity prices, that should reflect in our next quarter's profitability.
Oh, sure. Thank you so much for taking my questions.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, this was the last question for today. I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Suneel Mishra for closing comments.
Thank you, Rutuja, again, and thank you everyone for your participation. With this, we conclude today's conference call. In case if you have any other questions, then please feel free to contact me or Mr. Anshul Madaan on the email ID given on our website. With this, we conclude the conference.
Thank you.
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.