I hope all of you know about TVS.
We do. We do. We're minority owners across... Maybe just to give you the brief introduction. Axiom, we're basically growth-focused equity investors. I'm a generalist across... We have two emerging market strategies, call it $10 billion in AUM across the two. We've been minority investors in TVS for some time. I'm a generalist, I do cover TVS, if you will. I'm familiar with the story. Been following it for the better part of a year and certainly, a lot of admiration for what's been going on with the firm recently. Obviously, very strong, 2022 FY, you know, first half of 2023 FY. You know, excited to finally get the full team on the phone today and get a little bit more context around the story.
Yeah.
Okay. Since we have 45 minutes, it may be a good idea to go with your clarifications or questions, whatever you have.
Yeah, yeah.
I would like to invite you whenever you are in India, please do come to Bangalore and we can spend the day here. You can visit the factory, you can interact with us, and we can organize that. Kindly let us know in advance when you are planning to be in India.
I like that plan now. I appreciate the invite. Yeah, just to give a quick introduction for who else joined. Donald Elefson, he's been with Axiom for the better part of 10 years. He's a portfolio manager also on our EM strategy. Young Kim is also a senior portfolio manager across our EM strategy, so he's on the line as well. Andy, if you could hear us in the background, thanks so much for arranging the call. We certainly do appreciate it. Yeah, I think with that, I think it'd be great, yeah, to your point, just to jump right into questions. I thought a good place to start was just coming out of kind of high level, coming out of the January sales result yesterday.
Obviously an incrementally, you know, at least in my view, more positive month with, you know, sales improving both month-over-month and year-over-year, and EV sales continuing to track up really, really strong. Call it greater than 700% year-over-year. Maybe just to start there, when you think about that EV sales growth of 700%, obviously coming off of a very low base, how do you view the sustainability of those trends? Where do you see EV sales going? Any targets internally, you know, on that team?
Yeah. EV, as you know, we also said in our Q3 results call that EV is our focus. I hope you can all hear me.
Loud and clear.
Yeah. We have a combination of the product strategy and a series of products, what we have planned for the next eight quarters, the two-wheeler side and the three-wheeler side. The iQube, as of now, we have put the new three variants. They are available only in 200 cities from towns. I won't say all our cities. There is a great opportunity to scale up in all India level, which goes to almost 800, 900 level. Even these 200 places, we have a booking as on yesterday, something like 27,000-28,000. The one of the reasons why we are not expanding everywhere in India is that consumers are very eager to book it and pay. They want the next day the delivery.
We are in the ramp-up curve. Month after month, there are challenges. While things are improving, still we are not in the plan. For example, last month was good, INR 12,500, but we could have easily done another INR 1,000 more. Something stops on a, you know, some semiconductor not available or some part not available. It's not that the suppliers doesn't want to support. For example, this month, we should clock beyond INR 17,000, something like that. March, I am looking at can we do 1,000 a day? That's the kind of challenge I put to the team, and team is responding.
May not be to my satisfaction, but the most important thing is customers love this product. That is most important. Always you have to keep the demand ahead of the supply. There are two important strategies. One is to make sure that we cover more and more parts of India, and possibly next year move to something like some international market as well. Many of the distributors have seen this product, they are also very much interested. Okay, this is one. Number two, we have a series of product launches which you will see in the next four to six quarters in various segments.
I may not be able to guide you exactly what kind of products in which segment, I can promise you that fairly advanced work is going on. Once they come, you know, that will be different customer segments. Overall, we are looking at how do we scale up this to much, much higher level. My immediate target is to cross that 25,000 in March.
Got it. Got it. Yeah, I guess that's probably in line with the prior guidance that you gave on the last quarter. You know, one thing that you mentioned.
Excuse me? I don't know.
The 25,000 unit target for EVs. Oh, you breaking up a little.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Absolutely.
Sorry. The video.
There is no point in setting target if you don't achieve that, you know?
Right.
Once you achieve that, you scale up beyond that. In the meantime, you launch the new product, look at how much more you have the opportunity. The good thing is, we believe in customer, we believe in customer delight, and customers are responding to that. That is the good news. Now the ability to scale up and the ability to deliver more and more volume, that is the challenge which we are now working on. As we ramp up and more and more we will expand to more and more markets in India, maybe by September, October we may start some international markets. That is the kind of strategy we have. Of course, a few more products will come in the 2023/2024 financial year.
We'll have to again look at how we are going to position it, how we are going to launch it in some other cities in Indian markets, and how we scale up. Every product will have something unique, something connected, something really exciting, something really in terms of digital, which is going to really connect the customer.
Got it. When you think about-
Eric, can I?
Sure. Yeah, go ahead.
Can I follow on to what he just said? Thank you. You're saying with... by September, October you might be selling some international, but you have so much demand domestically, and you can go from 200 to 800 points of sale. Why even go international?
No. See, what we have to always look at is the. By September, if you start, it's not that international is going to start like that. You have to put some products into the market. You have to rightly understand what the consumer requirements, what the set of the infrastructure, you know. For example, even in India, as of now, the customers are using home charging. There is a lot to learn in this, in this area from the consumer side, unlike the ICE. We will scale up slowly and steadily. Maybe we'll start with couple of international markets and there is a learning curve. Like we did it in iQ. We started only with Bangalore, not even Karnataka as a state.
We went to a small city and then slowly we expanded to the urban areas. Now we are going to semi-urban area. Every area you have to have that interface with the consumer, how they are using it, how they are charging it at home, what kind of support we need to provide, what kind of service we need. The interface what we provide to the customer is very, very important.
Thank you.
Yeah. That's helpful. You know, you just kind of alluded to it and mentioned it earlier with the iQ brand, and obviously you've been particularly successful in scaling that up of late. Is the plan to continue solely with iQ with all these incremental model launches? Or is it possible that there'll be like another, you know, lineup and then product launches associated with a sub-brand separate from iQ?
There will be lineup. I may not be able to share the overall brand strategy.
Mm-hmm.
I can give you example of what you have seen in ICE. You have a Jupiter, you have a Jupiter 125, you have an NTORQ, you have a Jupiter 125. The there is a specific, you know, consumer segment and consumer usage. We will be looking at that way then we definitely want to differentiate.
All right.
iQ is a certain customer profiles. We are looking at it and, slowly and steadily that starts coming in, you know. We will look at certain brands and certain models for certain type of customer segments. That is the way it works. Price points will be different and the kind of features and the kind of technology. While we will leverage many of the common platforms, we will differentiate.
Is it fair to say that, you know, there'll be different brand options both in price above and below iQ? I mean, how do you think about perhaps a mixture?
I don't want to give you any kind of guidance on that.
Got it. Fair enough. Okay, cool. We'll be on the lookout for all the launches. You know, this is a very high-level question, and we're really seeing this more on the global side in autos, but at the moment we're seeing a lot of price competition in autos between, you know, all throughout different OEMs in China, Tesla obviously driving a lot of that. Are you seeing any incremental price competition in EVs or really throughout the lineup, or is that something that's not necessarily unique to India?
I think this price competition is inevitable.
Mm-hmm.
Even in ICE, whatever you see, you know, between competitors, there is always a kind of price tag. The strategy what we are using in the ICE will be similar strategy we'll be using. For example, I can give you an indication. You know, in Jupiter we have a basic model, which is peg it against Activa, which is the Honda model. We have a Jupiter ZX model. We have a Jupiter Classic model. We have a Grande model. You know, you peg it, you know, when somebody walks into the showroom or somebody comes through online, he looks at the price point and say, "I want something, this kind of a scooter," et cetera, et cetera.
The moment he looks at it and sees three options, and if he's typically a retail finance customer, he says, "What is the incremental price difference between?" Let's say it is 4,000 INR or 5,000 INR between this model and that model. I think the mindset of the consumer is when you give something, is it in line with the competition?
Mm-hmm.
When he have made the purchasing decision, what I have seen is they have made the decision, when they look at online or when they walk in, they always say that, "No, I saw another Jupiter ZX or a Classic or this one. This will suit me more, you know." Okay, another INR 4,000 is okay. If it is retail finance, 36 months, thanks to TVS, he will say, "Incrementally I have to pay another INR 100," which is one and a half dollars. That's okay. He, his mind is, he has already decided Jupiter, but he immediately makes a decision to go to the high-end model. Today, confidentially, I can tell you 50% of the Jupiter is in this variants what we sell. My opinion, comparisons are inevitable. Price competition is inevitable.
It is up to us, how do we use the technology? How do we give something more to certain type of customers? How do we differentiate it? How do we, you know, influence this customer? You know, okay, you have decided it is for the sales boy, sales girl, or on the online chat. You have decided that. Brilliant. Can I offer you two, three things? Would you mind looking at it? These are the customer benefits I am going to offer. I have seen one out of two taking that.
That's good. That's good. I guess that's inherently pushing people up the price curve is the ideal scenario, of course.
Basic belief is, we don't discount.
Sure.
We don't discount. We always encourage people to look at, "Okay, you want this price point, take this product, it is available." Okay? If you want this, this, this, you know, menu, you look at these are the features, these are things. I'm adding more value, more benefits to you. I'm always superior to competition. Look at it that way. That is the way I have started. Even in iQube, it is going to be like that. Even in the future competition, it is going to be like that. Products like that.
Got it. Got it. Perhaps on the other supply, demand side of the equation with your, you know, all the inputs. You mentioned semi supply easing up. That's become less of a concern. Obviously, that was an issue for not just you, but for everyone 12, 24 months ago. When you think about input prices and supply, whether semis, raw materials, what sort of dynamics are you seeing at the moment?
In ICE, I think the situation is far better. I would say that in the ICE area. When I look at iQube, you know, everybody has to integrate. Each one is looking at who's the least common denominator. You know, sometimes people come. The best way I do is those prognosis I look at next eight weeks, and I tell the people, "Look, I'm going for 25,000. You can be respectful." They will make short-term arrangement. The moment they see we are in that direction, they visit the plant, they see. Seeing is believing, you know. They look at the booking, they say, "Okay, we will try to put capacity. We will try to divert something for you." Because high-end auto grade, still the demand is continuing.
Mm-hmm.
Okay? Whereas in the ICE, where it is primarily ECU, those kinds of semiconductors, we are seeing much, much better supplies. Also we have made some alternatives. Earlier, we had only one supplier. Now we have two suppliers. Some areas we have three suppliers. Time has given us a little bit of de-risking.
Got it. Then what about outside of semis just for, commodities broadly? Any issues there on steel inputs, aluminum, anything like that, copper?
I don't think so far, we have seen in the last couple of months. The last couple of months may not be the right indicator because November, December is always slow. January, we are seeing now uptake in the market, and our numbers are much higher. We did 22% up in the domestic, you know, and our customer retails are pretty good. We have to see two, three months. So far, I think everybody's adhering to the schedule.
Mm-hmm. Got it.
In fact, I can say some of them are ahead of the schedule, which is positive.
Got it. That's all helpful. One thing, I just wanted to go back for a second. I was just looking at my notes from the last earnings call, I think one of the first questions you got on the call was around your unit guidance for EVs. Off the top of my head, I believe like a UBS analyst asked about the EV growth. Just looking at his note post a quarter, he was kind of implying that you were guiding up the expectation of 25,000 units from March 2023 to something meaningfully higher than that amount, but it wasn't entirely clear to me. Is it safe to say that the 25,000 unit guidance for EVs is still the firm guidance for March 2023? Okay.
I wish everybody supports us, you know.
Yeah.
Demand is not a problem.
Right.
Demand is not a problem because I'm moderating the number of cities and number of dealers.
Right.
You know, see, there is no point in committing anything beyond 25,000 at this point of time. I have capacity. If you visit here, my left side plant, now earlier I had a smaller plant, now I'm putting in the main line itself, my scooter production. You can see that.
Got it.
So, so the-
Hey, Aaron.
The more and more people have started to see that they say, "the company is moving." When, when you go to online or somewhere, people saying that you have to wait.
Hey, Aaron, could I follow up on something he just said?
Yes, please, Don. Jump in. Yeah.
Your dealer network is how big?
We have, if you ask me my network in the ICE, it's almost 1,200 main dealers and 3,500 sub-dealers. That is not a problem. Currently I'm dealing with about 200 ICE dealers for this. Of course online, and I've not gone beyond that. 100 cities, I have not gone away. Yeah.
what you're saying is, of your 3,000 ICE dealers, 200 are selling the EV?
No, 300. I think you should understand I have 1,200 main dealers. Under every main dealer, there may be three, four sub-dealers. Okay?
Yeah. Mm-hmm.
You should take 1,200 as the main dealer. Of that, I have given only 200 main dealers currently, iQube.
What would cause you to give more dealers iQube?
Supply. I have to produce more.
Okay.
I have to produce beyond 25,000.
what you're saying is
First I have to produce 25,000 because there is no point in, you know, waiting, making the customer wait. That is, that becomes biggest risk as such.
Got it. What you're saying is you have the infrastructure in place to double or triple easy your dealer network for electric.
These are all our ICE network. I'm not even inducting my new network. I'm not looking at new network.
How long does it take to set up a new dealer?
New dealer maybe three months. Three months.
Okay.
Six months. If he has got his own facility, you know? If he has got his own land, his own building. Otherwise, if somebody's going to set up new, normally in this kind of businesses, when somebody's approaching us, they will have their own building, their own infrastructure, everything. It's only branding and interiors and all that. Then it is three months.
Your existing structures can be set up immediately. They can just flip the switch and go.
Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. I, in fact, all my 1,000 dealers are ready to buy from me. I'm.
Good.
Giving the
Good problem to have. Thanks.
One just high-level question I had, and it was a big impact last year to sales after some, like, notable fires in the press at pure firms. I know Ola had a few fires. I feel like Ather might have as well, but perhaps I'm wrong. I feel like Ola was the notable one, and there was some, you know, big splashy headlines in the press in India about this. Certainly we saw that in the sales trend, you know, reflected in the sales trends, where consumers were really moving away from them. They were viewing as a newer brand, less trustworthy, and moving towards you and more legacy players that, you know, in my perception, they viewed as more trustworthy, higher quality.
Yeah, I guess when you think about that dynamic and how it played out last year, how do you think consumers are currently viewing the space from a quality perspective, and where do you see TVS fitting in that mix?
I think we always believe in, you know, giving good quality, and safety and good quality are very, very critical. That's also one of the reasons we are scaling up slowly. That is also one of the reasons I said even in the international market, you start, it will take six months to nine months. Every country has got certain customer usages, okay? India, while the public charging infrastructure all getting built up, currently we are seeing 80%-85% of the consumers charging at home. You need to be In my opinion, we have to be a little bit patient, you know? That's why I am also a little bit patient in this new technology, new usage conditions, how to be around them, how to understand them, how to support them.
You know, any new technology has got lot of failure modes. You have to analyze the failure modes and keep looking at it. We firmly believe in that.
Mm-hmm. Have you seen any fire issues, product quality issues with the EVs, any, you know, with the iQ brand? Any, you know, even if it's just idiosyncratic examples?
See, it's a part of a testing and proving journey. We have got excellent R&D facilities. We have a lot of testing facilities. We keep testing and testing and testing. This is a learning curve, you know?
Got it.
The fact that consumers are looking at us more positive, having a good quality and safety, it's only an order qualifier. You know? They should start feeling that this is also like a Jupiter or a NTORQ. My entire family... You know Indian typical style. The minimum two, minimum two plus two, four people. Good roads, bad roads, rainy roads, you have huge traffic jams, you have flyovers everywhere it should go. Technology agnostic. They don't look at which technology. Only thing is this is silent, and it is connected. It has got so many features, okay? In consumer's mind, they look at my usage, okay? It has to be robust. It's multiple factors. They look at multiple factors. It's not one factor they look at.
Got it. Got it. Maybe just back to guidance. I know the, you know, TVS and you and your management team don't necessarily provide too much forward-looking comments, but one thing that I know you mentioned on the last call was that you're viewing a positive inflection in 4 Q in the international segment. Obviously, that's been an area that's been lagging relative to domestic. If you wouldn't mind just spending maybe a couple minutes on the dynamics that you're seeing there, perhaps just highlighting a couple markets that you view as particularly interesting.
See, we always believe in India, I always believe in a 25-30 days of stock based on the 4th month phase, okay? I don't keep more than that stock. I don't allow my team to push extra stock. Like, from the customer point of view, because customer want, you know, fresh dosa. I will always say that you go to Indian, typically Indian people take the vada, like donut. You know, they want fresh, hot, crispy, okay? Like that, ideally the customer wants directly from the plant and you buy it. The more stocks the dealer keeps, you know, the more less fresh he will be able to give to the consumer.
That is one of the reasons we said we will not give any credit from the company. Most of, not most, everyone in India, all our competitors give credit. I give you money, and I bill him that money, and I charge you interest. We stopped that. We completely stopped that. The dealer has to bring in his money completely like international visit, cash and carry. When dealer is bringing the money, he will buy only what is being sold. When we give money, you know, in a truck, 40 vehicles, I can put whatever I want to also put. Okay? Here, that option is not there for my sales and marketing team. Purely what he's selling, he will buy. Only that money he will put. I want more and more that kind of a pull from the market, okay?
With a very clear condition that I don't want to lose any retail because the dealer doesn't have stock, but we can keep a very good working capital. I'm really proud that, you know, we have less than 30 days also. Same principle I use it in the international market. Only thing is you have a transportation time or a shipping time from India to various countries. You add that stock plus the distributor stock and the distribution stock there. For example, last month our retails are far, far ahead. I said, "Cut down the stock. Don't worry. Don't worry." Two, three months you cut it down, then the dealer will be on top of my head to take more and more, you know? Most importantly, customer will get a fresh vehicle.
Mm-hmm.
I'm always proactive. You know, I don't look at desktops. I look at customer retail, customer retail, customer retail.
Got it. As far as the demand dynamics in these markets, any trends that you're viewing in particular, you know, regardless of the legacy ICE or EVs, any markets that you're particularly intrigued by, interested by, concerned on at the moment?
Fortunately, you know, one good thing about TVS is we have the best range.
Mm.
We are looking at a very good. Even in the international market, I'm pretty confident that you will see a better February, better March. In fact, I'm trying to bring in the same systems what we use in the domestic in every international market. Most of the international markets are developing markets. Here, the distribution is I have 1,200 dealers. In international market, I have a distributor, you know? It goes there. From the distributor, he has got dealers, and he also has multi-brand outlets. Multi-brand outlets uses all competitor products, et cetera, et cetera. It takes time to bring in the TVS way of the customer, you know, experience and all this. That is the journey we are now going through.
We put it that way, and I see our products have got a good pull. Indian brand and TVS brand has got a good pull in the market.
Just maybe just spend a minute on guidance again. I know it's obviously fine if you're not comfortable in formalizing certain things. You mentioned the 25,000 unit target. You mentioned the sequential improvement in international markets. Just looking at, like, consensus in Bloomberg right now, I see, you know, revenue growth in FY 2024 to 2025 of, like, kind of mid-teens, if you will, 15%, 12%. Net income growth a little bit behind that, above that, call it 30%, you know, 30s-20% this year and next. Margins mid-20s%. Do you view all of that as broadly achievable? Any context on those numbers?
There are plenty of people making predictions about us. I appreciate all of them. Okay? I am a firm believer that focus on the consumer, rest will follow. I always say that first is consumer, consumer.
Mm-hmm.
Next is revenue, revenue. If the consumer is there, you can get the revenue. Once you have the top line, every line will follow. I'm a firm believer on that. Rest assured, that should, you know, in my opinion, even the international market, the severity what we were looking at Europe or. See, African market is getting affected because of this war and the inflation and all the, all the, all the, all the situations on the, you know, the depreciation of the currency. I think there is a huge impact, indirect impact, some direct impact. All these are little bit eased out. I won't say completely out, but what everyone thought and what likely happening is little bit soft.
Mm.
When I talk to the distributors, they say, "Yeah, we thought it is going to be very tough." Actually, I anticipate, that's why I cut sharply in January. People are saying, "Yeah, it is not that bad." You know. Customers are coming, customers are buying, you know. Of course, there are currency issues, there are devaluation issues, but demand is there. This is a very healthy thing. I always believe that when a consumer comes, he says, "Why don't you wait for one week?" Immediately the pickup goes up. You know. It's psychology. I always believe that little bit demand ahead of supply is always good. That, how much it should be, that's the feel. That's the feel.
As long as you don't miss the customer and he goes, "Yeah, now I'm going to the competition," then you lost it.
I guess changing the topic a little bit, pretty exciting announcement back in 4Q, calendar year 4Q, with Amazon. How do you view the partnership as progressing? Maybe if you could also just maybe comment on the logistics of working through that partnership, how you view it as developing over time, the nature of it. Really, really just any color. It's obviously a great opportunity.
I think these are partnerships which is definitely going to grow disproportionately. Amazon as a partnership, you know how they are expanding in markets like India and e-commerce, how it is, thanks to the lockdown, I think today's consumers deliver at home, you know. Including the number of people who buy items from home, not visiting. You know, typical Indian mentality is to go to the shop and shop. Now sit at home and shop, online shop. I, I'm of the view, I cannot put a number, but it is going to grow disproportionately, I can tell you. These are the kind of partnerships which is going to help us. My principle is they know us, we know them.
Amazon is a global network, you know?
Got it. I guess the obvious opportunity here is just.
Huge.
IQ for
Huge.
last mile delivery.
Huge, huge.
Yeah.
See, one most important thing about EV, according to me, so far, even in the international market, we are present only in the developing markets. You know, we are in the African market, we are in the ASEAN market, we are in the Latin American market, we are in Middle East. We are not yet there in Europe or U.S or all the developing market. This gives us a huge platform and an opportunity.
Yeah.
You know, that I said last time also, the new platform, whatever we are designing and developing for BMW is going to be a cool. I can't give you the specification, but it is going to be an amazing EV vehicle.
Yeah.
That is going to be a partnership which is going to really excite the market.
Got it. Got it.
Our product is also equally going to excite the market. I see it as a huge opportunity.
Got it. The next thing I was actually gonna comment on was to ask you about BMW and if you had any updates on that partnership. Obviously, that was announced, what, back in 2021.
Uh.
Yeah.
Closer to launch, I'll tell you, because there is.
Got it.
There is an agreement between both the companies that we will jointly announce. You know, that's fair.
Got it. Got it. I do have a few more questions, I also wanna highlight ESG and those sorts of topics before we finish. Young, do you have any questions? I know you always like jumping in. Don, obviously, if there's anything else. I don't wanna steal all the thunder here.
Well, I'm gonna be signing off here in a second to catch a train. Thank you so much for your time.
Young, before you sign off, will you plan the next visit to Bangalore and be with us?
I would love to take a ride on an iQube.
Please. Please come here. I would host you some good dinner. You can have a good visit to the plant. You could spend some time. You can see some very good birds which come internationally from various places. We have an amazing, you know, bird park inside the plant. You'll be amazed.
Wow, that's neat. Thank you for the invite. Bye. Aaron, thanks for the meeting.
Awesome. Thanks, Don.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
Thanks. I have just one area there I would like to get some more clarity on. Demand is there, just supply an issue. You know, how much is this a function of just conservative nature from you? You know, can you just maybe expound on a little bit further kind of supply chain strategy? You know, are there any changes that you are pursuing to?
No, you know, I disagree on the we are conservative. We are fairly aggressive. The approach we have now used is we are directly in touch with the big semiconductor suppliers. We are in line with them. Unlike in the past, where we go through some of the key suppliers and their suppliers, semiconductor, now we are directly inviting the semiconductor suppliers, and they come, they see. Seeing is believing. Now they are partnering with us, you know. I have suppliers who are completely supporting us. I'm very sure once you see this 25,000 happening, it is a question of time. Everyone wants to be partnering here, okay? Last year, same time we were struggling to convince people.
This year when I'm looking at it, you know, it's completely different. Please understand, I need same-day production. If I have to produce 800, I want all the matched material today morning. If I miss today, I can't make up tomorrow. That is the kind of. Ideally, I have to look at every day, how do I produce 1,000 per day? 25,000 will happen. That is the level of, you know, maturity we are looking at with some of the suppliers. They are, they're completely now reorienting with our requirements. I think that will be a brilliant change.
Maybe just to ask, you know, Young's question a little bit differently. Is there any incremental CapEx investment that you guys need to make at the moment to scale in any line of business?
No, no. Not for, not for INR 25,000. We already got the investments-
Okay.
everything done.
Okay.
When we go beyond, for example, the new products also we have invested. But when we go, let us say, from INR 25,000 to INR 50,000.
Yeah.
That may require some incremental investments, not in the building, because that's why I said when you come here, you will see suddenly the same factory producing ICE and EV. You know, battery management system, how do we create more controllers, more, you know, assembly facilities, more testing facilities. There are incremental CapEx which are not so big, but the real investment in the product creation, the new product creation.
Got it. Young, apologize. It looks like you just got dropped. I think you had a bad connection. If you wouldn't mind just commenting. Obviously, we've spent a lot of time on the semi supply chain broadly, and it sounds like you've broadly improved your relationships with suppliers throughout, you know, during COVID and post. Any areas of bottleneck, any areas of improvement within the supply chain?
It is. There is bottleneck. That's why, you know, we had some problems in the charges. Now they are debottlenecking. Now there are 1 supplier, now there are two suppliers. This is, you know. We are a company where once we commit a capacity to a supplier, we will honor them. When it goes to the next level, we'll index another supplier. That is the way, because there is something called trust. In TVS, we always say that the T stands for trust. You know, you give this supplier today, tomorrow that supplier, quality will get affected because there is a system of PPAP. There is a system of process quality proving, part quality proving, sub-assembly proving. They understand us, we understand. There is a very clear process.
Got it. Just to be clear, you said the bottleneck that you're seeing a little bit that still exists is on the charging side?
No. Charging, thanks to a couple of people more inducting and proving the quality. Like that, I gave an example of charging. That's all.
I see. I see. I see.
Like that, I can talk about many suppliers. Each one is now improving.
I see. Is there any... I guess maybe just final question-
The best way.
Yeah.
to answer you may be first week of April when I, when I'm able to deliver maybe close to 25,000.
Yeah.
every day happening, I think most-
Perfect.
of it will be done.
Cool. there's really no-
Proof of the pudding is in eating.
That's well said. Just to put a pin in it, there's really no area of the supply chain that you're particularly still nervous about. Would that be accurate?
No, I'm not nervous. I'm, how do I make sure that the daily supplies happen? You know, there is no delay. Today, I don't have the luxury of keeping stocks. If I look at ICE, you know, I request my suppliers to keep seven day stock. I'll keep one day stock. That luxury has not yet come anyway.
I see. I see.
So-
Okay.
They are supplying to production today. You know, you have to build stocks at every level. Okay, not all parts, you know. Some parts are getting built, and some parts are there. This is something, a journey, because when you are scaling up, this journey I have seen in even in TVS Raider or TVS Jupiter 125, you know, new products. This happens. This happens.
I see. I see. Okay. ESG, I'd like to chat about that for a minute. One thing that we look at a lot internally here at Axiom is just a way for us to look at the portfolio holistically, because we look at so many companies, is to use like third-party ESG providers, MSCI, Sustainalytics. There's one that we use called RepRisk, all sorts of different platforms, and probably the main one is MSCI. I guess when we started doing the research on TVS a year or so ago, and you know, we were, I guess, pleasantly surprised to learn that the firm was ranked AA or A or, you know, objectively a very strong rank. When you think about I guess maybe just very high level.
When you think about ESG, how does it factor into your calculus for the firm? Or how.
Sorry.
Sorry.
I couldn't understand the question.
Sorry. Basically, all I'm trying to ask is ESG is important from our perspective. When you think about ESG as a business concern for the firm, how does it factor into your calculation for planning, for reporting?
Oh, okay. ESG. You're asking about ESG.
Environmental Social Governance. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think you should come here and see.
Okay.
The best way is we have on one side the sustainability maturity model. On one side, we are looking at safety in a high level. I think when you come here and because I can give you a maturity score. The moment you come here and spend two hours and then come and meet me, you will get an answer. I can tell you, it's one of the best in India.
Got it. You're viewing that specifically on, like, a safety of workers perspective. Any other areas that you think you're focused on?
When we partner with somebody like BMW, they have their own standards, you know. Some of the partners.
Sure.
They look at all these global standards and are we in line with that? You know, it's already there.
Got it. Got it. One thing that I noticed in this MSCI report and, is that they say that you have not engaged specifically with MSCI. Our understanding of how it works is like MSCI, this third-party rating agency will reach out to all sorts of firms that they cover, TVS and otherwise, and, you know, with a questionnaire of sorts, and they seek a response from the company. If the company responds, they're able to more holistically get an understanding of the data and come up with ranks and such. One thing, this seems like very low-hanging fruit, if you will, an easy thing to fix, is that they noted that you have not engaged with them. I guess, does your IR team or any sustainability style employees at the management level have plans to engage?
No, no issue. No issue. I think we can engage with any such rating agency. That's not a problem.
Okay.
There has to be purpose. There has to be purpose. We want to understand what is the purpose, and we can always do that. That's not a problem.
Okay. Okay. Typically, in like example, this happens all the time, obviously, tons of firms are, especially, in India and similar markets, are obviously ramping up their thinking on ESG as it becomes more important globally. Typically, our response would be...
ESG, I said I have a maturity model, and we are one of the best in India as of now. We are also looking at which are the areas to improve on the global standards and, you know, we are also working on that.
Okay. Yeah, I'll probably send, you know, maybe through Andy and Macquarie, like, a link to you all, for ways to engage with MSCI. It's something that we always encourage the firms that we're invested in. To the extent that you're willing to engage, it's something that we look at very favorably.
Okay. Okay.
Cool. Is there anything internally as far as targets, even like carbon emissions or safety standards or different, like, quantitative metrics that you think about as a firm?
We have all quantitative standards. There is a separate sustainability book also published by the company, and there are standards. Also we look at not only within. For example, you know, we use between wind and solar, almost 90% is from that in Hosur plant. Other plants are at 80% level. Same way, water discharge, zero discharge. There are many parameters. On safety, there are many parameters. That's why I said, the biggest way, you know, I can, I don't know whether I can send it, but I can show you how we have developed a bird park behind our R&D.
Okay.
That shows. It's all the discharged water from the plant.
Got it. That's good.
You have fish, and you have kind, you have 87 varieties of birds coming here every year. Even today you can see that.
Got it. Got it. You know, one thing I noticed, I think it's on your IR page or somewhere buried on the TVS website, is that you publish a Business Responsibility Report. I think that's perhaps just part of, like, reporting requirements. Is there any intention to publish, say, like a broader ESG corporate social responsibility sustainability report?
Yeah. Yeah. For example, in the corporate social, we are already covered more than 2,500 villages.
Okay.
Srinivasan Services Trust is one of the best in India. We are little bit conservative. We don't share some of the achievements because we say that we are doing it for social, not to get publicity.
I see.
It's not TVS. We don't publicize the good work what we are doing for the common man. For example, if you had come here during COVID period, every day we used to make 50,000 food packets and delivering to every hospital in Karnataka, every police station, because they were not getting food. Breakfast, lunch and dinner. We never had any problem for getting any ICU beds in the hospital. They were saying, "Anything for TVS, we will do." We were the company, we imported the oxygen saturation kits and gave it to all the hospital. We are much proactive in this kind of social service. These 2,500 villages, we went and did vaccination free of cost.
Mm.
So.
Got it.
Anything else?
Um-
Only thing is we don't. Since you asked me, I'm sharing it.
No, I appreciate it. It's great.
Normally you won't see this sort of standard for TVS anywhere.
Excellent.
Because Mr. Venu Srinivasan doesn't like publicizing this.
Yeah. No, understood. I. We really appreciate your openness to discuss all these topics. I know they could be a little sensitive and uncomfortable and these sorts of things. No, thank you very much. Is there anything else? I know we're on, up on time. Is there anything else that, you know, you and your team would like to highlight here at the end? Anything exciting?
Visit. Visit TVS.
... you wanna point out? Yeah.
Okay. All your questions-
I like that.
... will be answered.
Okay.
By seeing the eyes of my employees in the shop floor, all will be answered, I promise you that.
Excellent. Well, look, thank you so much again for speaking with us. Hopefully we can.
I will.
continue the dialogue.
Before I close, I will only give you.
Please
... one thing about my employees.
Yeah.
Average, I get one improvement by employee in his work area every day, every week. Okay? That is 52 improvements, either on productivity, quality, cost, delivery, waste or fires or safety or whichever area. There are 700 families, there is a home Kaizen. These family members have shared this, and their spouses run this on energy saving, safety, environment, pollution, water conservation, education in and around their society, in their home. Okay? Thank you.
Awesome. Well, look, thank you again.
Thank you.
Thank you to, Andy and Macquarie for arranging and, yeah, be well. Thanks. Thank you.
Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Bye-bye.
Cool. Bye-bye.
Thank you, sir. Thanks a lot for taking time out.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you.