Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the Q2 and H1 FY 2023 earnings conference call of Granules India Limited. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in a 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. Irfan Raeen from Orient Capital. Thank you, and over to you.
Thank you, Yashashree. Good evening, everyone. Myself Irfan Raeen from Orient Capital. We are an investor relations advisor to the company. I hope that all of you and your families are safe and healthy. On behalf of Granules India, I extend a warm welcome to all participants on Q2 and H1 FY 2023 financial discussion call. Today on the call, I am joined by Dr. Krishna Prasad, sir, Chairman and Managing Director, Dr. K.V.S. Ram Rao, Joint Managing Director and Chief Executive Officer, Ms. Priyanka Ma'am, Executive Director, GPI, and Sandeep Neogi, sir, Chief Financial Officer. I hope everyone had an opportunity to go through our investor deck and press release that we have uploaded today on exchanges and on company's website. Before beginning with the call, I would like to give a short disclaimer.
This call may contain some of the forward-looking statements which are completely based on our belief, opinion, and expectation as of today. These statements are not guarantees of our future performance and involve unforeseen risks and uncertainties. With this, I hand over the call to Dr. Krishna Prasad, sir. Over to you, sir. Thank you.
Thank you, Irfan. A very good evening to all of you, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you very much for joining us today. I'm sure all our investors had received the proceeds from the buyback by now and are happy that the company has the interests of the investors as a priority. All of you would have gone through our numbers, and Sandeep will also take you through them. Let us only dwell on some key indicators. During the current quarter, we continued and improved on our performance on all fronts compared to Q2 of FY 2022 and Q1 of FY 2023. While net profit has grown, the most important and satisfying parameter is the cash position. We have generated operational cash of INR 218 crores as compared to INR 181 crores during Q1 2023.
After accounting for CapEx, we generated free cash of INR 124 crore compared to INR 98 crore in Q1. As explained in our last call, our focus continues to be free cash, and we will continue to focus on this. As of today, we had completed the buyback and had incurred an outflow of INR 310 crore, including taxes and other expenses. We are confident that after taking this amount and future CapEx into account, we will end up with a positive cash flow and reduce net debt by the end of the current fiscal year as compared to March 2022. On the business front, while we continue to see price erosion in the U.S., we will continue to offset it through increased sales in other geographies and increased focus on operational efficiencies.
This has been an ongoing issue for the past many years, but Granules have been able to successfully manage this. On the positive side, the slow downward trend in raw material prices is continuing, but the cost of energy had gone up, adding to our cost. The international freight rates, especially for reefer containers, had not reduced much during the last quarter, but we see a downward trend in Q3 already. The supply of PAP and DCDA, some of our important raw materials, had been stable, and we expect it to continue and possibly improve. The political situation in Europe had caused disruptions in raw materials coming out of this region. For us, we were impacted only on excipients. We are mitigating this by qualifying alternate sources from other geographies.
Work on the DCDA project is proceeding smoothly, and we expect to see results in less than two years. R&D is progressing smoothly, and details of the ANDA filings, approvals, and DMF filings are in the investor presentation. While we continue with our current business model and keep trying to grow it, I am greatly excited that our journey towards Granules 2.0 is proceeding smoothly, and we are all excitedly looking forward to the positive outcomes from this. As usual, I request our JMD, Dr. Ram Rao, to take you through this journey. Over to you, Dr. Ram Rao.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Good evening, everyone on the call. I echo the views of the chairman on a very satisfying second quarter performance of the company. In my last quarter remarks, I spoke about Granules' long-term strategy on science, technology, and innovation. I'm very happy to confirm that our strategy relating to this is on track. We made decent progress on the enzyme and the fermentation technology-driven product development and completed proof of concept for a couple of projects. We are also making good progress on the continuous process development effort and B- and DCDA, and as pointed out by the chairman, we should see the commercialization of this product in the next couple of years. The R&D and portfolio management strategies are much more robust now and are based on the initiatives of science and technology.
We have also made a very good progress in institutionalizing ESG as a way of doing business for us. All these science technology related initiatives are going to increase the R&D spend in the subsequent quarters. As also communicated in the last quarter, we see huge untapped market potential for our core molecules in Europe, South Africa, and EMEA countries. We have now started expanding in these markets. The first set of the European launch of some of these molecules through our partners is likely to happen during the quarter three. With this, I hand it over to Sandeep for financial updates.
Thank you, sir. Let me take you to the top financial parameters now. Revenue. The second quarter revenue was INR 1,151 crores as compared to INR 888 crores in Q2 FY 2022, growth of around 30%. This growth is mainly attributed to increased business in the U.S., especially in the API segment. The revenue share of non-core molecules stood at 16%, which is higher mainly because of the increased core sales in the current quarter. Even though in percentage terms the others have decreased, but in absolute numbers showed a marginal growth. The sales break up as per business verticals and details are presented in our investors presentation, which is available on the website. Value addition, which is basically sales minus cost of material consumed.
Value addition percentage in Q2 has contracted by 1.1%, mainly due to segment mix, as in this quarter API sale was more. EBITDA and EBITDA margin. EBITDA for the quarter was INR 243 crore when compared to INR 151 crore in the previous year, same quarter, an increase of 61% over the previous year, mainly on account of increased business across major geographies. R&D. Our R&D spend for the quarter was INR 25 crore as compared to INR 47 crore in the same quarter in the previous year. It is expected that R&D spending will be in the range of INR 40 crore-INR 45 crore in each quarter going forward. Net debt. Our net debt was INR 553 crore as compared to INR 613 crore in the last quarter, mainly on account of repaying of the long-term debt.
Our focus on cash collection has also resulted in free cash of INR 184 crores in the current quarter. Cash to cash cycle. Our cash to cash cycle was at 141 days in the current quarter compared to 144 days in the previous quarter. The decrease of three days was mainly attributed to a reduction in the receivable days due to factoring of invoices. Operational cash flow. Operational cash flow for the quarter was INR 218 crores when compared to INR 101 crores in the previous year's same quarter. Higher operating profits and the focus on working capital management contributed to higher operating cash flow in the current quarter. CapEx spend during the quarter stood at INR 94 crores. With this, I open the floor for 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 their touch-tone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use a handset while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. We have our first question from the line of Rahul Vira from Abacus. Please go ahead.
Hi, sir. Couple of questions from my end. Just want to understand, is the gross margin on para-
Mr. Vira, you're not audible, sir. Can you please speak louder?
Hello. I'm audible now?
Yes, please go ahead.
Yeah. Just want to understand, that is the gross margin on paracetamol lower than the other products? Because in the quarter when the sales have gone up in paracetamol specifically, since that gross margin is not to the mark, you know.
You're right, Rahul. Gross margin on para is lesser than other products.
Okay. Was there any one-off in this Paracetamol sales in this quarter, or you are seeing this kind of traction going forward as well?
There's no one-off, Rahul. Actually, basically the whole thing came from availability of raw material. Now the supplier of PAP has stabilized. We see this going forward. Market was not a problem for us. We had marquee customers and they continue to be with us.
Sure. Sir, so if given the incremental sales from Paracetamol, they and that too from U.S., the percentage of sales has increased sharply. We were targeting to enter more markets like European or even the LATAM market side. How will this shape up now? How will the ratio move now?
You mean Paracetamol in U.S. compared to other geographies? Was that your question?
If Paracetamol in U.S. increases sharply.
Yeah.
Compared to other geographies.
You know, we have some marquee customers in the U.S., and also we are trying to convert most of them from API to finished dosages. Also, our European launch of paracetamol formulations is happening now in this quarter, Q3. There will be increases in both segments, but I think U.S. will be a higher share for paracetamol.
Okay. Sir, any other contracts or large key customers that we would have added in the past couple of quarters?
No, I don't think so. These are customers who have been with us. With increased market volume share, they are getting with them.
Okay. Sir, what is the capacity utilization of plant for Paracetamol as of now?
Paracetamol is around 90%, 95%. Around between 90% and 95%.
Okay. Fair point, sir. I'll come back and get to you, sir.
Okay.
Thank you. We have our next question from the line of Krish Mehta from Enam Holdings. Please go ahead.
Thank you for taking my question. I just had a question to clarify on the finance costs, you know, given that the debt has come down. Could you explain what contributed to increasing the finance cost for the quarter and what the blended cost of borrowing was?
I think, Sandeep, you should take that.
Yes. Finance cost has increased, actually for everybody because of the SOFR rate has increased. When we started the year and where we are seeing the SOFR now, there is a 3.5%-4% increase in the SOFR, and that has resulted. The spread has not increased for any of us. SOFR rate increase has actually resulted in a kind of cost of borrowing being higher.
How would you view the finance cost over the next few quarters? As you know, when debt comes down, how do you view the mix changing?
We do not see that the SOFR is coming down drastically. If the SOFR continues at that level, we can only assure you that the spread will not go up. Obviously it will be in the same range.
Okay, thank you so much.
Thank you. A reminder to participants to press star and one to ask a question. We have our next question from the line of Ashwini Agarwal from Demeter Advisors LLP. Please go ahead.
Hi. Good afternoon, team. Thank you for taking my question, and congratulations on a very, very solid quarter. Couple of questions. I mean, your last, say, 6-8 quarters have been unusual in many ways, right? First, we saw very high margins because of COVID-related shortages.
Ashwini, sorry to interrupt. Can you use the handset, please?
Yeah. Is this better now?
Yes, please go ahead.
Yeah. My question is,
Ashwini, sorry to interrupt you again. It feels like you're on speaker, so we are finding it a little difficult to hear you.
Let me come back. Mel, can you take the next question?
You're clear now.
Okay. What I was saying was that I was trying to figure out, you know, the way forward. Last two years have been very challenging for the company because first we saw excessive one-off gains because of COVID-related shortages, especially in metformin and ibuprofen or paracetamol. Then we saw product shortages and shipping costs coming down. Now, at least on the raw material shortages and shipping costs, things are normalizing. The FD contribution to overall revenues has also gone up. We are kind of right-sizing the sales across various geographies. If I look at the long-term history, you know, value addition has been more or less around 50%.
If I look at the long-term history, then EBITDA margin has been, you know, in the region of about, say, you know, 21, 22%, in some years, but on the lower side it's 16%, on the higher side it's 26%. Over the next two- three years, where do you see gross margins and EBITDA margins stabilizing at given all the initiatives you are taking?
Okay, Ashwini. First of all, let me say it's like you said, 2021 and 2022, both are aberrations. 2021 was a positive aberration, 2022 was a negative aberration. 2023 is start of returning to normalcy. But due to uncertainties today in the world, I'm not able to say how much improvement we'll make. I don't see any possibility of deterioration, any normal possibility. In this uncertain world, we don't know where we will go. I think we should be going with an EBITDA of. I always said we'll be slowly creeping up from our 20%. We corrected it, and year-over-year we'll definitely creep up, and our target is to get to 25%. When it comes to value add, the situation is it's the product mix that always dictates.
We are going towards high-margin products, but all these things will be visible only after two years onwards. Like I said, it's Granules 2.0, which is going to transform the company. There we will definitely see higher margins. Meanwhile, we continue to face and mitigate the challenges that are occurring in today's world, especially price erosion in the U.S., and disruption of supply chains in different parts of the world. Initially it was China, now it's Europe. There are many mitigations that are going on, so I cannot see gross margins going up. But definitely once 2.0 takes place, we will definitely see a great upside. We are all looking excitedly for that.
Okay. On a more specific basis, could you quantify the size of savings that are possible on shipping rates?
All I can tell you is we were as high. I'll just give an example for a reefer container. Prices were as high as, I would say $12,000-$13,000 per container, Q1. Q2 it came to around $12,000. This quarter we already see $8,500, $8,000, and looks like they're still going to possibly go down.
pre-COVID these rates were at, what, 3.5? Would that be a fair guess?
No, no, no. The reefer container would have been around $4-$5.
Four-five. Okay. Would this kind of offset the R&D expense pickup? Because R&D has obviously helped the EBITDA margin in the current quarter, but R&D will normalize over the next two quarters as you suggest. So will lower shipping costs kind of offset the R&D headwind?
There are a few areas where we see savings coming in, and definitely, freight cost is one. If you see in the second quarter, the freight costs drastically played a very important part of our cost. Freight is one, and there are a few other areas where we see which will get offsetting, which will offset the R&D expenditure.
Okay. All right. That's all I have, sir. Congratulations once again.
Thank you.
Thank you. We have our next question from the line of Rashmi Sancheti from Dolat Capital. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Good evening, management, and thanks for the opportunity. I'm audible, right?
Yes, Rashmi.
Yeah. Okay, sir. Sir, first I want to know about U.S., you know, related to the price erosion. In the first quarter you all mentioned that, you know, Granules is facing high double-digit price erosion. What is the current status over there, whether you know, it has really come down or not? How many new launches have you done in first half? If you can quantify, you know, out of those new launches, how many new MUPS technology launches we have done from the developer?
I think it's good that Priyanka takes up this question. Priyanka?
Sure. Hi. To answer your first question, in terms of price erosion, there is still quite a bit of price erosion that we are having to deal with. The good news is that it's not as drastic as double digits, high double digits right now. The market is slowly beginning to stabilize. We are positioned and we are positioning ourselves to make sure that we don't lose out on market share because of price alone. In terms of the number of launches from MUPS, we've done two launches in Q4 of this past year, and we have been increasing market share and winning more awards for those two products.
Outside of those two products, we will be launching a few products in Q4 of this fiscal and Q1 of next year with MUPS. In addition to that, we did one more controlled substance launch from the U.S. facility. How many would be total new launches, which include MUPS and the other products, in first half? We did about three launches in the first half. Going forward, in the second half we'll be doing about one-two more launches. We haven't reached our target market shares for these three products yet, so we will be aggressively bidding on these products as well.
Okay. What about Metoprolol Succinate approval? We had some query on it. Have you responded to the U.S. FDA?
What is the current status over there?
Rashmi, you seem to be knowing more than us about what's happening.
Pardon, sir?
You seem to be knowing more than us about what is happening.
Okay.
No, I don't think you should be the-
Everything is going.
Go ahead, Priyanka.
Sorry. Everything is going on track, and we should be able to launch it as planned.
Okay. All right. Related to the Paracetamol, you know, the revenue mix has gone up, you know, in this quarter. We should treat this as a pent-up demand because API has stabilized, or we are, you know, based on some order visibility and all, we believe that Paracetamol revenue run rate would be higher, you know, in the second half as well as in FY 2024 also?
The same trend will continue, Rashmi. It's not a pent-up demand. People were waiting for us to come back on track. It's also, like I always said, we cannibalize on other markets, other customer, other suppliers. It's a shift from some other supplier to us.
Okay, understood. Lastly, you know, sir, can you give some direction in terms of revenue growth for API, PFIs and FD? Because this quarter we are seeing some extraordinary growth and even for past, you know, the growth is extremely high, especially in the API as well as in the PFI segment. Could first half would reflect similarly in the second half or we think that, you know, there would be some overgrowth which would be due to the season or something in the second half.
No, we could see some improvement in the second half, but mainly, Rashmi, it's not the revenue that we are looking at. And that it's not even the bottom line, it's the cash that we are generating. Of course, without revenue, without bottom line, we cannot get the cash, but it's also a product mix and what business to take, what business not to take that determines the margins. Definitely we will be improving on our cash position and bottom line. Let's not focus too much on gross margins. Sorry, on revenue.
All right, sir. Thank you. That's it from my side.
Thank you. We have our next question from the line of Varun Basrur from Principal Asset Management . Please, go ahead.
Yeah. Good afternoon, sir. Hope I'm audible.
Yes, Varun.
Yeah. A couple of questions. First is, what percentage of the finance cost in this quarter is attributable to factoring of receivables? And the second question is, of the cash to cash cycle, what percentage or what kind of inventory of raw materials inventory are we keeping on hand?
Any other question, Varun, or is that it?
No other questions.
Sandeep, you want to go ahead?
Our factoring cost is around 40% of the total finance cost for this quarter. Regarding the inventory, sir, you may want to
The inventory there is, I mean, I don't have just the raw material number with me. It's the total inventory, which includes inventory here on the CE and also in the US. Last quarter we had 179 days as compared to 182 days in the previous quarter. Receivable days have come down. It was 74 from 83. Payable days also have come down from 121- 112. Overall the net effect is three days on cash to cash cycle. Let me just clarify a bit, Varun, when Sandeep said 40% is the cost of factoring. If we don't factor, we would have had to take some working capital debt and the difference is not much.
Between factoring cost and working capital, TCFC is a marginal difference.
Understood, sir. Thank you, sir.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, in order to ensure management is able to answer all queries, kind of restrict your questions to two at a time. We have our next question from the line of Maitri Parekh from Pi Square Investments. Please go ahead.
Yes, I have two questions.
We are not able to hear you.
Can you hear me now?
No. Your voice is breaking.
Just a minute. Can you hear me now?
Yes. Please go ahead.
My first question is that, you know, what is our market share in Paracetamol domestically and, you know, globally, if we have the number?
I don't think we can give out that information, Maitri. It's a little sensitive with competition, and we prefer not to discuss this in an open forum.
Okay. The second question is that, you know, what is the revenue concentration of the top five customers?
I think it should be around 30%-40%, Maitri. A little more than 30, I would guess.
Oh, okay.
I don't have the number offhand with me.
Okay. No issues.
I can definitely tell you top 20 customers will not be more than 60%.
Oh, that's great. Okay. The third question that I have is, that is the raw material that we import. What is the percentage of total raw material that we import, and from which countries do we import?
Mostly we import from China and Europe, a little bit from U.S. also. U.S., maybe about 10% of our total imports may be coming from the U.S. Overall, our imports should be about 30% of our revenue.
Okay. 30% of revenue. Okay, no issues. How much are we dependent on China? I mean, if you know there's some problem and if we are not able to import from China, do we have the alternative?
Yeah. The two materials we import from China have been DCDA and PAP. Now PAP, there was a shortage in China that's streamlined now. We also have Indian manufacturers and other international manufacturers who have come up. There's a lot of mitigation that has happened, and we don't see a very great challenge on this product. On DCDA, we have one supplier out of Europe. Now with the costs of energy going up in Europe, they're not very economical. Now China is economical. Basically if you say DCDA, we are still quite dependent on China. Again, to add to this, the whole world is dependent on China for metformin, for the intermediate of metformin. No other country makes this except one company in Germany.
Okay. Yeah, sure. I think that's all from my side. Thank you.
Thank you. Reminder to participants to press star and one to ask a question. We have our next question from the line of Tushar Bohra from ENAM Ventures. Please go ahead.
Yeah, slight correction, it's ENAM Ventures. Thanks for the opportunity, and congratulations to the management for an excellent set of numbers. A couple of things. A, I wanted to understand about some of the new initiatives. You know, details around the HIPO and onco plant and also, you know, the biologics asset that we acquired, if there's clarity on the strategy regarding biologics as a whole going forward, as well as some of the other work that we're doing under Granules 2.0, if you could sort of explain in more detail.
I think this is a question for the panel of Dr. Ram. He'll be able to speak better.
I think, as I mentioned in my speech, we are focused on the high potential, this oncology block and HIPO block. I think, earlier also we indicated that we are going to focus on the oncology formulations, and as discussed, the progress is in the right direction. We are able to see a good traction with the customers in terms of business development leads and also how we can use the capacity utilization there. I think it is going in the right direction as far as the HIPO block is concerned. Coming to the second point on the entire enzyme fermentation and what R&D assets and capabilities that we have got.
We are able to really foray ourselves into enzyme-driven product development. We have done a proof of concept of a couple of products, and we seem to be quite happy in the direction in which the results have come. Very soon we will see this getting commercialized through our enzyme and fermentation technology route into the API manufacturing. I think as a part of the strategy, what we started in the beginning, as explained in the first quarter, we continue to have this journey and we have made sufficient progress to see that the strategy is now started, you know, into the execution mode. Definitely, fermentation enzyme is much ahead of ours.
Also on the continuous process development, we have started looking at couple of products and, including DCDA, and as Chairman has pointed out in his speech, and as I also told in the next couple of years, we should be able to come out with a commercialization of the continuous process development of this molecule. We are also looking at several others. Suffice it to say that, the strategy that we are now calling it as Granules 2.0 has taken off, both in terms of execution of the products, projects, and also reshaping our portfolio as a long-term strategy for the organization.
Thanks. As a follow-up to this, you know, also on the MUP side and, you know, some of the complex generics, we've been filing the last four years and, you know, pretty much last two and a half years, we've got a number of approvals in place, which we've steadily been launching in U.S. markets. Just want to understand as far as execution where we are vis-à-vis, you know, what we were envisaging, this portfolio to be, and how soon can we see real traction in the other molecules, such that it starts to become a much more meaningful percentage of the total?
Tushar, some of the very important filings which we have made are actually approved in the MUPS area. Like Priyanka said, we will see some in Q4 of this year and some in Q1 of next year. Those will be decent products. Meanwhile, we have some products which have been approved and we are steadily launching them. The strategy of going slow, I think it's better we hear it from Priyanka.
Hi, Tushar. In terms of going slow, like, we've always said, Granules would continue to focus on maintaining and gaining market share with a certain our threshold of profitability in mind. In the U.S. market, with an increased amount of competition for all the products, our first goal is to maintain security of supply and two, slowly but steadily gain market share, which involves a little bit of patience and making sure we have a certain amount of inventory ready to go at any given point of time. If we have to get to a certain large market share, the only way to do it overnight is to cut down the price of drugs, which is not what we plan on doing.
Like I said, we are in the third quarter of gaining momentum for two of our biggest current products from the MUPS block in India. We continue to gain market share on those two products, where customers themselves have reached out to us saying, "Your competitors are not able to supply, can you do it?" With that, we're able to make sure that we set our value proposition right in the U.S. market, and that's where we want to be as a company. Going forward, we'll be doing the same with all the MAB products coming out of this pipeline.
Oh, great. There was one point raised on Metformin, I think on DCDA on the supply side, some issues. I see overall Metformin has been slightly flattish for us last couple of quarters. In fact, even this quarter year-over-year we are flattish. Is it something that, you know, we are due to supply security or supply-related concerns, we are not able to fully leverage the potential? I mean, or do we see this as a transient phase and we should be able to grow back in Metformin, aggressively?
Tushar, in the U.S. we already have a decent share, and I don't think we should try to get more share at the cost of margin. As Dr. K.V.S. Ram Rao Said, we are going slow. We expect to maintain our margins. You know, there's price erosion. We can give in some, but we cannot give too much. We would like to stabilize that rather than increasing market share at low margin. Other geographies, we have just started launching. This quarter we are launching Paracetamol products in Europe, and possibly next quarter we should be launching some Metformin products in Europe and other geographies in the form of formulations. This should keep growing. It won't grow at a very rapid pace. Europe is still virgin, but we'll do well.
Okay. By the way.
I request you to come back in the queue.
Sure thing.
Thank you. We have our next question from the line of Kaushik Mohan from Ashika Group. Please go ahead.
Hello, Hi, Kaushik .
Hi, Kaushik.
Hi, Hi Kaushik. Sir, I just wanted to know on the PAP side, sir, do we buy PAP from India?
Yeah, we do, Kaushik.
Is it for, like, can I know the supplier? Is it from Sadhana Nitro Chem or something like that?
Not from Sadhana. That much I can tell you.
Okay. What is the Indian prices that you buy, sir?
Prices are almost the same, competitive everywhere today. You know, that's a surplus product.
Right.
It's almost the same.
It is as equivalent as the U.S.
Ch-China.
Sorry, China. Sorry. It's as equivalent as China.
Yeah, a little bit here and there. They vary, but more or less.
How about what is the strategy for us for Paracetamol in Europe? How are we doing there in Europe?
We sell a lot of paracetamol API and PFI in Europe, and we also do some contract manufacturing of paracetamol tablets for certain customers, including some brands. Right now we are launching our own dossiers along with partners. We filed for some products, and this quarter we will launch in two countries.
Sir, is there any changes in Paracetamol because of the quality of PAP?
If the quality is bad, product is bad. The quality of PAP is not bad. You know, it's fairly decent. It's of the same quality. We had some problems with one or two new suppliers, but we've worked with them to make sure the quality comes out well.
Okay. There is a new definition in this PAP, right? It's nitrobenzene route. How about do we buy the PAP in that route or in any other format of PAP that we are buying?
Nobody makes it from nitrobenzene today for sale in the market.
Okay. Thank you. Thanks for that. Have a good one.
Thanks. Same to you.
Thank you.
Thank you. A reminder to participants to press star and one to ask a question. We have our next question from the line of Maulik Parekh from Anand Rathi. Please go ahead.
Yeah, good evening, sir. I just have one question.
Good evening.
Our sales have grown on the API side and mainly from the Paracetamol side. Just wanted to know that, is it because of increase in realization of that product or due to increase in volumes of that product?
It's actually volume. I don't know if you were here in the call right from beginning. We mentioned that we have availability of more raw material, and that has led to increased production and increased sales.
Okay. Sorry, I would have missed that. Okay. Okay, sure. Thanks a lot, sir.
Thank you. We have our next question from the line of Suresh Aggarwal, an individual investor. Please go ahead.
Good evening, sir. Good evening.
Good evening, Suresh.
Sir, what's our dividend policy, sir?
Suresh, you know the amount of buyback we did. We will give it back in the form of dividend or buyback, whichever way. Our priority is to make sure the investors are benefited. If you calculate the amount of money that was given, you can understand what we are planning to do.
His line is disconnected.
Okay.
We'll move to the next question from Ashwini Agarwal, from Demeter Advisors LLP. Please go ahead.
Hi. Just a follow-up question from me. You know, I'm referring to your opening remarks where you said that, notwithstanding the buyback and the planned CapEx, you still expect to generate free operating cash flow, which will be used to reduce debt. Considering that, you know, the value addition margins and EBITDA margins are likely to be steady, that kind of, you know, hints at very strong second half in revenue growth. I just want to understand what's driving that confidence?
It's mainly going to be a working capital management, Ashwini, and it's working with our customers for quicker payments and reducing the receivable days. We are working with our suppliers to increase the payable days. Inventory is a very cautious approach we are taking, because if you don't have enough inventory in the U.S., you could end up with failure to supply penalties, which could be disastrous. That's a very careful. We need to really study this but we are very cautious on that. To answer your question once again, to sum it up, it's mainly reduction of receivable days and increase of payable days. I mean, the inventory, raw material inventory in India, we could possibly reduce, but not the finished product.
Essentially working capital is going to get a lot tighter in second half. That's going to be.
All our money or conversion of operational profit into operational cash was not great in the past because all our money was getting sucked into working capital and we were really, you know, our borrowing was so low that the cost of borrowing, we felt it was okay to at one point in time it was only 0.6% before the SOFR went up. We didn't really bother. Now we thought the focus has come on cash and cash alone. We thought, let's get the cash in.
Okay. Thank you, sir. That's helpful. Thank you and all the best and happy Diwali.
Thank you, Ashwini. Happy Diwali to you too.
Thank you. Reminder to participants to press star and one to ask a question. We have a question from the line of Tushar Manudhane from Motilal Oswal Financial Services. Please go ahead.
Just one question on the overall investments into Onco, HIPO, and biologics assets intake, and how much do you intend to invest maybe in FY 2023 and 2024?
Onco investment is INR 90 crore. For this biotech company, we have only invested INR 13 crore.
No, going forward.
Going forward investments. Look, we have already given a guidance for this year and next year is going to be INR 300 crores each.
Not in this too.
We don't expect to invest anything in the Onco plant, but on the biologic side we'll definitely be investing. After this, the investments could be higher after this year, next year, we'll see what it turns out. This year, next year will be INR 300 crores each.
Very much, sir. Thank you.
Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, to ask a question, please press star and one on your phones now. As there are no further questions, I would now like to hand the conference over to Dr. Krishna Prasad for closing comments. Over to you, sir.
Ladies and gentlemen, once again, thank you very much for joining us today. I would like to reiterate that we are working hard to continue the run-up just like we had in Q2, and we will strive our best to make sure that we continue to grow profitably. Thank you very much.
Thank you, sir. On behalf of Granules India Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us and you may now disconnect your line.