Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the Q1 FY 2026 earnings conference call, Apcotex Industries 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 this conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star, then zero on your touchtone phone. Please note that your conference is being recorded. At this time, I would like to hand the conference over to Ms. Nupur Jainkunia from Valorem Advisors. Thank you, and over to you, ma'am.
Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone, and a warm welcome to you all. My name is Nupur Jainkunia from Valorem Advisors. We represent the investor relations of Apcotex Industries Limited. On behalf of the company, I would like to thank you all for participating in the company's earnings call for the first quarter of financial year 2026. Before we begin, a quick cautionary statement. Some of the statements made in today's conference call may be forward-looking in nature. Such forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ from those anticipated. Such statements are based on management's beliefs as well as assumptions made by information currently available to management. I would like to caution not to place any undue reliance on any forward-looking statements in making any investment decisions.
The purpose of today's earnings conference call is purely to educate and bring awareness about the company's fundamental business and financial quarter under review. Now, I would like to introduce you to the management participating with us in today's earnings call and hand it over to them for their opening remarks. We have with us Mr. Abhiraj Choksey, Vice Chairman and Managing Director. Without any further delay, I request Mr. Abhiraj Choksey to start with his opening remarks. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Thank you, Nupur. Good afternoon, everyone. There is an echo, Nupur. Can I request you to echo me? Thank you again. Good afternoon, everyone. It's a pleasure to welcome all of you to the earnings conference call for the first quarter of financial year 2026. With me, I also have our CFO, Mr. Vivek Sahai, and our GM Finance, Mr. Suraj Badale. I hope you have had an opportunity to review the financial statements and earnings presentations, which have been circulated and uploaded on our website and the stock exchanges. Let me provide you with a brief overview of the financial performance for the first quarter, ended June 30, 2025. The operating revenue for Q1 FY 2026 today is INR 376 crore, reflecting a year-on-year growth of around 12%. Operating EBITDA today is around INR 39 crore. That's roughly 22% year-on-year growth.
The operating EBITDA margin improved to 10.3%, up from 9.45% in Q1 of FY 2025. There was a strong growth on PAT as well, with a total profit after tax this quarter of INR 19 crore. The PAT margin for the quarter was 5.11%. The strong performance was driven by the highest ever quarterly sales volume. Overall, our volumes grew by 25% year-on-year, even though the revenue grew only by 12%. A combination of product mix, I guess, and of course, raw material prices are lower in Q1 of this year compared to Q1 of last year. Overall, 25% year-on-year volume growth, and I would say mainly driven by export revenue that grew by 37% year-on-year as far as revenue in terms of INR crore is concerned. The overall exports contributed to 37% of the overall revenue, the highest ever that we have had in terms of exports.
I'm also happy to report that we have delivered consistent sales volume growth for six straight quarters. Improvement in EBITDA margins was also driven by higher volumes and improved capacity utilization, reflecting enhanced operating leverage and cost efficiency. Overall, while the environment around still remains fairly uncertain, especially around the tariffs and several geopolitical tensions, our capacity utilization in Q1 for the latex plant in Taloja is at about 85%, and our Valia Mysore latex plant was around 90%. For NBR and other products, we're pretty much running at almost 100% capacity utilization. We will be planning further de-bottlenecking and expansion projects, which we will announce shortly once the details are finalized. With this, we can now open the floor for questions for the question and answer session. Thank you.
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 their touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Ladies and gentlemen, in order to ensure that the management is able to address questions from all participants in the conference, please limit your questions to one or two per participant. Should you have a follow-up question, we will request you to rejoin the question queue. 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 Dhaval Shah from Garrick Capital. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Am I audible? Hello.
Hi, Dhaval. Yeah, go ahead, please.
Hello, sir. Hi. My question is with respect to the export performance. It has been phenomenal, 25% volume growth. Can you share more details about the reasons you think for such a good performance on the exports front? With respect to has it been more a product approach in terms of customer, competition from other countries, other exporters? Has it weakened, or some other factor? How do you see going forward, from a strategic perspective? We are at 37% of our revenue per the exports. How do you see those numbers going forward? Also, from a longer-term perspective, how do we, once we do an expansion, what will be our strategy with respect to the exports? Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you a lot for the question. Just to correct you, there's been a 37% growth in volumes for exports. The 25%, not volume, sorry, value. 37% value growth in exports, and that has just largely come from new approvals. As you know, Mysa latex business, you know, we are at almost now 100% capacity utilization. I would say about 90% capacity utilization, not 100%, but we are at about 90% in Q1. Obviously, a lot of new approvals have come through. We have been aggressive in terms of gaining market share as well. In addition to that, there have been some new products launched for some specialty applications and construction applications. It's also resulted in this increase in export revenue and export customers.
Okay. Okay.
Yeah.
How do you see this share growing forward?
I think once, if you recall, and I think you've been around previous calls, when we did about INR 200 crore, INR 220 crore of expenses, which we commissioned in March, April 2023. It's been a little over two years. We had said that at that time, we were a little over INR 1,000 crore in revenue. We had said that with these expansion projects, we would be looking at about INR 1,600 to INR 1,700 crore in about three years. I think we're on a run rate to get there, if not this year, then early next year, a quarterly run rate. That's what we're delivering on. We also had said that it would be about 40%- 45% would be exports out of that. I think that's where we will end up by next year, somewhere between 40%- 43%, 40%- 42%.
Great. Great.
It is not just for the sake of doing exports. There is also a few, recall some, what, 10, 15 years ago, Apcotex Industries Limited has been mainly a domestic company, and we were more mainly dependent on the India market. Now, obviously, we have diversified just as a diversification strategy that we do want a good chunk of our revenues to come from outside India. We thought we had to happen, but India still remains our main strategic market with over 60% of our revenue.
Got it. The second question is with respect to our exports to Turkey. Given the kind of hostility in terms of relationship between the two countries, have you seen any impact on your revenue?
Lots of it was the political issue between the two countries. I think we, I mean, I've said we definitely had higher revenue to Turkey in the past. I would say it's more because of these wars and the issue around the Suez Canal that sometimes it's taking longer to get to Turkey, the materials. As a result of it, some customers are not too comfortable with the long lead times. That was a major reason why business to Turkey has been affected. I think maybe two, three years ago would have been our highest sales to Turkey. It's definitely dropped since then. Of course, it's been made up from other countries, and we continue to do business in Turkey.
Got it. Okay. Thank you very much. Let's come back in a few.
Thank you. Our next question is from the line of Aditya Keshav from Swift Institutional Equities. Please go ahead.
Thank you, sir, for your question. The first question is still in this chapter. Obviously, nitrile latex space and SDR latex both have contributed to volume, but that has not seen to a big challenge. Any particular reason why costs, you had mentioned that the costs is that the raw material prices are lower. The RM prices are lower and volumes are kicking in. Ideally, also gross margin could have kicked up, but it is lower compared to RMY in quarter on quarter.
Yeah. I think the reason why our average EBITDA margins for nitrile latex are much lower than our average EBITDA margins, and obviously, a good growth has come from there. In spite of getting some operating leverage due to increase in quantities, the truth is that nitrile latex margins are still on brink because of overcapacity. While they're pushed through with volumes, the margins still remain a challenge, and they're still fairly low.
Got it.
Without nitrile latex, our margins would be maybe, I'll be honest, that's hesitant, but at least, you know, a couple of percentage points higher.
Got it. Sir, this 19th number, like we were earlier talking about INR 600 crore addition to the top line. INR 400 crore already has been added in a span of three years. That has again not flowed to EBITDA. As you mentioned, Nitrile latex has lower margins. When you see like that, the pitching points would be like any particular quarter you see wherein we would start making better margins in Nitrile latex because that was our earlier ambition when we started this project.
Yeah.
When do you see the margins returning to normal?
I would say we have added INR 400 crore in about two years, not three years. As you'll see, over the next one year or so, further addition would happen. Hopefully, INR 1,600 crore or so by next year, or a little bit higher. I agree. What happened post-COVID was unexpected. I mentioned in many calls that first, there was a lot of glove inventory, then a lot of overcapacity, which continues in the industry. Difficult to say when it would turn. We've also, in the middle, had a better quarter, like Q4, we thought was a better quarter, and the U.S. tariffs uncertainty started in Q1 has again been not such a great quarter in terms of EBITDA for nitrile latex. I would say it's been a little lower than Q4. We see improvement in Q2.
Until we now see two, three quarters of consistent improvement, we won't really know where the market is going. There's a lot of uncertainty around these tariffs for who know. Finally, we're in a land, we won't know perhaps for another couple of quarters. That's why the glove industry is affected, because there's glove industry in China, Malaysia, Thailand, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, everywhere. Eventually, it's about how those tariffs will affect because the U.S. does remain one of, it just remains the largest market for medical gloves here.
Got it. Sir, just one last question. Sir, also the demand for vending or select the paper and construction, which is still motivated. Like the last quarter, we were mentioning that. How has that changed materially? Sir, second, onto the expansion, like the bottlenecking, we are planning to proceed that by this fixed amount, and what would be the cheapest and the amount of the capacity?
Yeah. To mention, the paper and domestic market overall does remain challenging. There is an overall, it feels like a slowdown, but we have still pushed through. As I said, some pockets have grown, not as much as exports, of course, but some pockets have grown. As far as expansion plans are concerned, I mentioned in my opening statement that once the details are worked out, we will definitely, sort of, come back to you at the right time. I think, shortly, it'll be quite shortly, and we are going to focus on our latex, SDR latex, trim latex, and MDR. This is going to be the focus of our expansion plan. We'll come back to you with the questions that you've asked very shortly.
Got it. Thank you, sir.
Thank you. Our next question is from the line of Bala Subramaniam from Arihant Capital. Please go ahead.
Good afternoon, sir. Sir, my question is regarding the capacities. I think our current capacity may be sufficient for next one or two quarters. You mentioned about some de-bottlenecking and all. How much CapEx is expected in this financial year, and how much is for growth CapEx and how much is for replacement CapEx?
Yes. I think we will consider enough capacity for this year, for this financial year, and perhaps for some amount of next financial year as well. We will come back to you with, as I told the previous caller as well, Mr. Aditya, that we come back to you with the exact expansion plan perhaps by next quarter or maybe even earlier than that if we're ready to announce.
Okay, sir. Sir, long-term perspective, we are targeting around 14 %- 15% kind of margin. Like, what are the levers in terms of product mix, fixed cost, construction? What are the levers to achieve those margins within this long-term perspective?
One of the strong levers, of course, is nitrile latex margin that, you know, we need to ensure that comes up in the mid-teens or early teens. In addition to that, focusing on some especially going growth to improve margins. The third is the operating leverage growth. You can already put it in, I would say. It has been a challenging few quarters, of course, in terms of margins mainly because of nitrile latex, but also because of capacity added for other products. We have added for SDR latex, DP latex, several other things that we have done in the last two years. That capacity absorption takes time. We have seen that once capacity gets to about 85%, 90%, then, you know, margins tend to improve as well. That's what we expect over the next few quarters. Three or four things will be improving margins over the next few quarters.
Okay, sir. Sir, regarding that, how great power per day is, let's say it's around 65%- 70% of Gujarat Power Plant leaves. I just want to understand what kind of cost savings and how this will impact in the upcoming years in terms of margins and cost savings.
In terms of cost savings, it's not significant. That's one of the main reasons why we're doing it. One is to, of course, be a responsible corporate citizen and ensure that more and more of our power comes from renewable sources so that we reduce our carbon footprint. That's the main reason. The total investment from Apcotex Industries Limited for the Gujarat project is, I think, around INR 3.5 crores or give or take INR 3.5 to 4 crores. The payback from the IRR is pretty good. Obviously, that will start kicking in from next year once the project is commissioned. I don't think it'll very largely impact the total EBITDA of the company. I think we've done it more from an ESG standpoint and, of course, commercially very viable.
Okay. Sir, my final question regarding exports-wise, I think U.S. tariffs and foreign flows on paper have disrupted trade flows. Are we seeing any pricing pressure in non-U.S. markets because of redirected Chinese supply? Secondly, the recent Israel-Palestine conflict has impacted the project latest exports, especially on Turkey and Egypt side. How is this demand really right now? Any alternative markets we are exploring?
Sure. For the first question, yes, the Chinese, they said the tariffs on China have sort of upended the glove supply chain overall. Our customers tell us that non-U.S. markets where there is no competition because of China. However, as you know, we are a small percentage of the total glove manufacturing for gloves. I think our customers are, overall, I think there's a benefit to what has happened for our customers. There's a lot of overcapacity in the market, both on the glove side and the latex side. That will slowly take some time for capacity utilizations to go up. Obviously, no new capacities have been announced. The second question on Egypt and Turkey is, yes, certainly our exports, especially the carpet industry, have been affected. It's not that it's not been affected, but it's not because we're still continuing to do business.
Maybe our volumes have dropped somewhat over the last two years, but we continue to do business. Unfortunately, we can't make it up specifically in the carpet segment because those are two large carpet manufacturing countries. Of course, to some extent, Saudi, UAE, where we continue to do business and grow that business.
Got it. Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question is from the line of Farokh Pandole from Avista Fund Management. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, Abhiraj. Happens to the strong result. I just personally wanted to ask about nitrile latex. What sort of level of profitability have we had at this point? What are the sort of times that you see going forward?
Sorry, sir. Voices are very clear. Can you repeat that question?
Sure. Sorry, sir. Voice is breaking.
Yeah, can you hear me now?
Yes.
Yeah, sure. Go ahead.
Yeah, my first question was on nitrile latex. What kind of margin level are we at this point, because obviously, we've now come up to almost, whatever, full capacity? What is the sort of way forward you feel, given the experience of the last few quarters?
Okay, the other question?
I know you mentioned that you will revert with the CapEx plans, etc. I just wanted to ask, would that mean that we would be running a higher debt equity going forward, or will we be largely able to fund things organically?
As far as the nitrile latex, I mean, it's low margins. As I mentioned, it improved in Q4. Q1 was, I mean, again, you know, absolutely things are improved in Q1, to be honest, for nitrile latex overall margins. Again, Q2, we have seen some small improvements. Let's see how the rest pans out. As I told the previous caller, overall, the economies are still plus. Overall, main issue is overall market, honestly. The market needs to improve for us to go back to about, you know, 12 to 16% EBITDA margins as we were expecting. As far as the CapEx plans are concerned, it would be a combination of debt and internal accrual.
Okay. Do we see a substantially higher debt equity ratio going forward?
Not substantially higher. I mean, our debt equity ratio is anywhere at, you know, currently it's at 0.3. I mean, it would maybe go up slightly in the short term, but not significantly.
Right. Okay. Great. Thanks.
Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question is from the line of Manav Vijay from MV Investments. Please go ahead.
Yes, thank you very much, sir. Am I audible?
Yeah. Yes.
Okay. Thank you. Sir, first question is regarding the small investment that you have made for the wind power activity. Apart from this INR 3.4 crore, do you intend to invest more for such power going forward?
Yeah. Hi, Manav. Yes, our intention is to invest more. In fact, for Maharashtra, we went close to also signing an agreement for our Maharashtra plant. Unfortunately, there have been some rule changes that have been announced recently as a result of which we're kind of just waiting to see how that lands. MSC DSL has made some rule changes on not allowing banking, etc., which has changed the commercials completely. In the short term, maybe at Taloja plants, but in the long term, as our power consumption goes up in Valia with further expansions, then we would look at it, but not immediately, maybe after a couple of years.
Okay. My second question is regarding your freight cost. After power cost, this has become the second biggest item and is now almost equal to your power cost. Has this freight cost normalized because now exports are forming a large part of your sales? Going forward, you're mentioning that exports will continue to move up.
Yeah, what's the question? Sorry.
Has this freight cost normalized, all the volatility that we were witnessing the first couple of quarters back? That volatility has subsided?
Yeah. I mean, look, it's only not as bad as we were during the post-COVID sort of years. There are certain corridors, especially around the Suez Canal, where freight costs are still reasonably high, but they're settled. This is what it seems it's going to be. I mean, unless those wars obviously will have an impact from time to time. These tariffs may have an impact from time to time, but it's not what it used to be during that COVID period two years ago.
Sure, my next question is regarding the anti-dumping case that you were having, that case filed with the government. Any updates on that if you can share?
That's in, sort of, I would say, advanced stages of the investigation. It definitely moves forward. It's been about nine months or so since, or maybe more, nine and a half, 10 months since we initiated the case. Generally, these cases are disposed within a year. If not a year, there might be a delay of a couple of months. I think in the next two to four months.
Hello?
Yeah, I said in the next two to four months, we should have an idea with how that pans out.
Okay. Sure. Okay. My last question is regarding your XL latex. If you look at the results of some of these companies, like let's say your Top Glove and the Hartalega type, we said the volumes for them have moved up on a YoY basis very strongly. Actually, prices haven't. Is there any kind of, let's say, discussions with them that they are telling you what kind of outlook they are having on price improvement for the next one year or two years? Is there any kind of a decision that you're having with them?
I mean, look, those are constant discussions, but they would have, they're all generally speculations. We have seen in the past that customers have also been going both ways. You know, sometimes they're too pessimistic and suddenly things improve. You could come with the target of the tariffs, for example, in April, and actually help them in terms of their volume, the American tariff on China. Now, some of these customers. Overall, as I said, the main issue seems to be, you know, capacities have not created for gloves and for latexes in 2022, 2023. You know, that slowly, ironically, utilizations have improved, but in the example of about 80%, 85%, you know, these margins will be under pressure for sure.
Okay. My last question to you. In your annual report, you have disclosed that you had INR 12 crore of export incentives. There are INR 450 crore of export sales, which is at least 2.5%. Is that the maximum benefit that we are eligible for?
Yes, that's the maximum benefit we're eligible for. Correct.
Okay. Thank you, Nupur Jainkunia.
Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question is from the line of Rohit from ithought PMS. Please go ahead.
Good afternoon, sir. Am I audible?
Yes, Rohit, go ahead.
Yes. Just a couple of clarifications. You mentioned that we are pretty much almost at the peak utilization so far for products, and maybe another quarter or two, or maybe, let's say, two or three quarters, we probably get to the peak utilization. You also mentioned that you probably do some de-bottlenecking and some CapEx. At the same time, the margins for most of the things, most of our products, have not, especially nitrile latex, have not really improved. Previously, you had mentioned that you would sort of wait for things to improve, especially on the nitrile latex part. Can you just share your thoughts at this point of time? How are you thinking? Because, as you have alluded, you've really improved on the top line, but the second has really not enabled us with margins.
With more capacity getting added from our side, for most of the products, we are the leader. How do you see the margins, except, of course, nitrile latex? How do you see the margin evolution in that context for capacity expansion that we're planning, let's say, in a year?
Obviously, we are not looking at expansion for nitrile latex at all. In the current context, it doesn't make sense. The expansion would be for other products that we are currently already in. Those products, even though they are also good, some of the margins or EBITDA margins have not been as strong as they were, let's say, a couple of years ago. The returns on the investments, and as I said, once I have the exact numbers of the CapEx investments in cores as well as the additional volume and value that we would derive from this, even at, you know, sometimes difficult margins, the return on capital or the ROCE for these projects will still be above our thresholds that we look at while investing in any project. I hope that answers your question. Even when I'm looking at it, no nitrile latex investments right now.
Okay. In nitrile latex, what is the utilization that we are at roughly?
We are at about 90%. If you want, we were close to 90% or around 90%.
Okay. I think, sorry, maybe I misheard you or I didn't hear you properly, but you said that margins will improve as utilization eats up, right?
What I meant is pretty much. It's in terms of the utilization, not compared to.
Oh, sorry. Okay. Sorry.
We are able to, at least, we are, you know, we honestly, we're a small plant compared to some of the global giants. We are the only company in India. Glove manufacturing in India has increased in the last couple of years. We are able to export to Southeast Asian countries. There is an India-ASEAN FTA, so there's no duties. Freight is quite reasonable to these countries. As a result of which, we have been able to improve our capacity utilization. The reason why margins are not improved is because of overall industry utilization rates. They're not able to drive the pricing that we would want, you know?
Right. How do you see the overall industry position? I mean, more customers must also be willing under pressure in terms of low realization .
Yeah. There are no investments happening in the industry, of course, across the entire gloves value chain. The investments that happened a couple of years ago, that's being sort of slowly, you know, utilized. The growth continues. If you see any report, there's double-digit growth in medical gloves. Obviously, there was this one or two years of this huge, you know, one-time kind of bonus growth due to COVID. Obviously, now it's normalized, and the normalized growth continues. We hope sooner than later, honestly.
Is any capacity shutting down because of this low pricing and low margin, either in nitrile latex or in gloves?
Company in Japan has announced that in 2026, they will come out of the nitrile latex business. There will be a whole plant in it.
have any sense on what kind of capacity is that, or?
I think these are all publicly available, so you can get it here.
You're not sharing the quantum of CapEx yet, right? Or have you shared that?
Not yet. We're not fully ready. We're just working out the last parts of the details. Perhaps in the next phone call, or if we're ready before that, we would inform the stock exchanges.
This would be largely groundswing, obviously.
Sorry?
Groundswing. This would be groundswing.
Yeah, groundswing. For sure, groundswing. Yeah.
Okay, sir. Thank you very much, and all the very best for the coming year.
Thank you.
Thank you. Our next question is from the line of Dhaval Shah from Garrick Capital. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Yes, sir. My question is with respect to the outlook on the ROCE of the company, since you are, you know, on the drawing board for the CapEx plan, a better, you know, if you have a better margin, better product. How do you see the ROCE? To see our historical ROCE of the company has been 15%, 16%, and that was also the number for FY 2025, you know, leaving aside those two years of abnormal profits where we made very high ROCE. Do you think that this number can, you know, go 2%, 3% higher or go towards 20%? How should we look at this going forward?
Yeah. Before we embark on any projects, unfortunately, the ROCE has been lowered and has been pulled down by nitrile latex for the last couple of years. Otherwise, it would have been even higher, because then we've definitely not got the returns that were expected when we embark on the project. Overall, when we embark on any new project, which is any significant investment, we look at an ROCE of at least 20%- 25%, between that number. Below that, we don't, that's generally unsuccessful. The idea is to, if the returns on nitrile latex improve, and at least we feel confident on our brownfield side, we would be closer to 18%, 19% ROCE, not more. At Q1, also, the ROCE, I think, has been 18% +.
Understood. Got it. Actually, does your product go in for the application of this, you know, your new age manufacturing which is coming, you know, the companies are putting up, our great TCBA factories are coming up in India, bring it to the board. Related electronic manufacturing, anywhere there is an application of your product?
There is an application for in batteries, in the star batteries. I think specialty application, unfortunately, it's not a big market in India. I think the large battery plants are in China and Japan, U.S., and so on. While there is an application and we're working on it, it's not a big market in our sort of geographic things. No, not the electronics manufacturing that you are talking about. No, the current product won't have any significant attribute there.
Okay. The new project, which you are working upon, the applications will be similar to where they are. What will be the major application and industry?
It will be all our latex products, other than nitrile latex. At the same time, carpet, construction, textiles, and also NBR, all kinds of rubber products, whether it's automotive or industrial applications, agriculture use. All of those, wherever NBR is used. Those are the two sort of main thrust areas for now for the upcoming CapEx.
Okay. Got it, sir. All right. Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Rudraksh Raheja from ithought Financial Consulting. Please go ahead.
Thanks for the opportunity. Am I audible?
Yes, sir. You're audible.
Yes, go ahead. Yeah. Yeah.
How do you see the pricing trend in NBR, not latex, NBR?
Can you elaborate on that? What do you mean by pricing trend?
What I recall is that, for the past few years, the pricing, we are almost at full capacity utilization in NBR. You mentioned along the similar lines. I'm trying to get if there is any pricing improvement or any trend of increase in prices, so that would help our margins for NBR.
Yeah. Pricing is a factor of many things. You know, obviously, raw materials is a pricing factor. When raw material prices go up, NBR prices go up and vice versa. As far as predicting where the price goes, it's very, very difficult. I would say in the last few quarters, we've had some quarters where prices have suddenly fallen. Like in Q1, prices have fallen compared to Q4. It's very hard to predict because it's all linked to oil and downstream petrol, not even oil. I would say crude oil and downstream petrochemicals that are going to NBR, mainly butadiene and acrylonitrile. It's hard to predict pricing.
Understood. Sir, any new specific applications for products that we are working currently, which could be exciting going into the future?
We don't track much amount that honestly because of competitive sort of reasons, but yeah, we already have launched quite a few products in specialty applications. They're not large volume, but specialty applications, which could in the future have a lot of potential. Yes, that's true. We'd rather not talk a lot about it right now. If there is anything significant to report, we'll let you know.
Understood, sir. Thank you.
Thank you. A reminder to all participants, anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touchstone telephone. Our next question is from the line of Deepak Admira from IGE India. Please go ahead.
Yeah, thanks for the opportunity. If I heard correctly, you mentioned Japan will be in nitrile latex capacities coming in FY 2026.
Not working. We will shut down in FY 2026. I had to cut you off because I just wanted to clarify.
Okay. Got it. What sort of capacity that is getting introduced?
I don't have the exact number, but if you can look at our online, it's all available.
Of course, thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the questions assemble. The next question is from the line of Om Prakash, an individual investor. Please go ahead.
[Foreign language] Namaskar, Abhiraj ji, kya aap meri awaaz sun pa rahe hain?
[Foreign language] हां जी, वन प्रकाश जी, दे रही है।
[Foreign language] हां, सबसे पहले तो आपको इंप्रूव प्रेजेंटेशन देने के लिए बहुत-बहुत बधाई।
[Foreign language] थैंक यू।
[Foreign language] चार क्वार्टर में प्रॉफिट आपके साथ कंटीन्यूअस बढ़ रहा है, और लगता है आगे के लिए बढ़ता ही जाएगा।
Yes, thank you.
[Foreign language] अगली बात ये है कि अपने एक्सपर्ट फैमिली में Vivek Sahai जी के CFO बनने के लिए उनका भी स्वागत है और ठाकुर जी की कृपा से Vivek जी अपने विवेक का उपयोग करते हुए Apcotex Metro को बहुत अच्छे से इंप्रूव करेंगे, यही आशा करते हैं। साथ ही हमारे Sachin Karwa जी, Sachin जी का भी थैंक्स है कि बहुत अच्छे से उन्होंने मैनेज किया और बाकी आपने जो पिछले कॉलर्स हैं, उनको बता दिया कि अपना एक्सपेंशन का क्या प्रोग्राम है और capacity utilization कितना हो रहा है। लगता है सही direction में हम लोग बढ़ रहे हैं। बहुत ही खुशी की बात है।
Thank you, thank you, thank you, Om Prakash ji, thank you for your support.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Nirav from an individual investor. Please go ahead.
Hello, am I audible?
Yeah, go ahead, Nirav.
Yeah, just wanted to know about Apcotex's landscape update next quarter. What is the revenue contribution and the growth prospects and utilization for Apcotex?
Honestly, I don't know the exact numbers because it's just a smaller part of Apcotex Industries Limited, and we are not required to use separate numbers right now. It has been challenging, I would say, in Q1. In general, the Indian market, as you would be seeing in generally all coatings and construction, has been a little challenging. The growth has been a little muted. We have grown, but not significantly in Q1. We are also looking at some internal sort of manpower changes that we have made. I'm quite optimistic that we'll be back on the growth pattern by the end of the year. I mean, the annual numbers will be good. Q1 has been challenging on Apcotex Industries Limited, honestly.
Okay. Very good. In general, for our company, are we seeing both growth in exports or in domestic market growing forward?
In the domestic market, we already have high market shares in most of the products that we are in. We are growing, I would say, along with the markets, plus some increase in market share, some, it's been others. Generally, the domestic, some new applications that, you know, we have been adding over the years. That's the domestic industry growth. The one opportunity that does remain is NBR, where, you know, we have a very low market share. It's not very low. I would say we have a lower market share, and about 70% of the product is to import from outside the country. That remains an opportunity. The last couple of years, we've not gone ahead with the expansion because of certain margin reasons. Now, we are reevaluating it as we speak.
Yes, the growth is largely driven by exports, I would say, over the last couple of years, and definitely in Q1 as well.
This has been very lower capacity and somewhat lower capacity utilization for several years. Are the capacity utilization numbers improving for the competitors in nitrile latex? We can see the margin books growing forward.
That improves any, I don't know when, sense in our case we are at, you know, almost 90%. We are at 90% capacity utilization. We have done our bits, but overall in the industry, it remains tight. We are not able to get that price to where we would like to go. Maybe $100, $150 more than what the current prices are. That remains a challenge. The rest of the product range, which is, you know, it's more than 80 kilowatt overall sale, there we are seeing some improvement in margin slowly as well as capacity utilization ranges.
Okay. Okay. I think in NBR, we are having 20% growth from imports. We are on that. What are the factors, what is driving imports and not imports domestically? Like, are the costs very low for imports?
There's a lot of dumping happening as well, which is one of the examples of fighting the anti-dumping case. For example, China has incurred a duty of, I think, anywhere between 12% -20% on imports from Korea. They have levied an anti-dumping duty, and it's been going on for the sixth year. It's been renewed after five years. China is seeing, and there are a lot of that material. China imports from Korea have less than halved. They come less than 50% of what they were less than three years ago. Obviously, some of that material is finding its way to India and other markets. India is a good market where, especially if they're export-oriented companies and consumers, then they have no option. They don't have a domestic market. They will get priced at any, any, they'll try and get a market at any cost or any price.
That's what we are representing to the government of India, and we'll see what happens.
Okay. Is there a big difference in the pricing of imports and out or is it lower there?
Yeah. They are competing with them. Obviously, we would not have 30% of the market and not be running at almost full utilization for a while if we were not competing with them. Margins could be better if there is shared competition.
Right. We are operating on several products like these for carpet and other industries. Where do we see usually the highest margin in India?
There are some districts where it's not by industry, and it varies quarter on quarter. It just depends on what's happening in those industries. I would say customer-wise, sometimes if you have a specialty product even within paper, we get very high margins for that. On average, I would say they're all very comparable. Paper has been a little lower over the last year, year and a half or so. Construction, carpet has been higher. Construction, carpet, textile, just because of the nature of the industries and more specialty products in those segments. I would say in the last couple of years, paper has been the lowest out of these four segments at least.
Okay. Okay, sir. Thank you for that. Thanks, sir.
Thank you. A reminder to all participants, anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touch-tone telephone. Ladies and gentlemen, we'll wait for a moment while the questions assemble. Ladies and gentlemen, as there are no further questions, I now hand the conference over to the management for closing comments. Over to you, sir.
Thank you, everyone, for taking the time and joining us on Q1 conference call. We look forward to seeing you in Q2, hopefully, you know, sometime around the value of this. Thank you very much, and thank you for your support.
Thank you. On behalf of Apcotex Industries Limited, that concludes this.