Welcome everyone, and thank you for joining this Q4 and FY 2026 earnings conference call of Zen Technologies Limited. The results and investor updates have been emailed to you and are also available on the stock exchanges. In case anyone does not have a copy of the same, please do write to us and we'll be happy to send it over to you. To take us through the results of the quarter and answer your questions we have with us today, Mr. Ashok Atluri, Chairman and Managing Director; Mr. Hariharan Chalat, Chief Financial Officer; and Ms. Abhilasha Atluri, Investor Relations. We'll be starting the call with a brief overview of the performance, which will be followed by the Q&A session. With that said, I'll now hand over the call to Mr. Ashok Atluri. Over to you, sir.
Good morning, everyone. I just want to do a recap on the current products that we have and talk about the future products that we are going to launch. The main point here is that there is a North Tech event happening in Prayagraj as we speak, and our products are being introduced there. I'm very excited about what's happened in the product space. The result, you know, I'll leave it to Hari to, you know, make the presentation and field the questions with respect to that. I'll just start the share here. Can you see that?
Yes, sir. We can see that.
Yeah. Very, very broadly, you know that, what has happened in the past, you know, few months is that the two areas that we were focused on, which is anti-drone systems and the simulators, both have gained so much of prominence in the war, recent wars that have happened. The first thing is anti-drone system without, you know, without much, you know, argument in that sense. The Iran, Israel-Iran war, that first part was completely drone-based or missile based. Whoever could for every rupee get the maximum mileage won the war actually. You know, we can see that while they were launching $30,000 Shahed drones, they were being countered by $3 million, you know, interceptor missiles. Complete missile math was completely mixed up.
One takeaway from that was, you know, that anti-drone systems are playing a big role. In addition to just pure software jamming, hard kill options have to be there. In hard kill, the ideal situation is for every $30,000 attack that happens, can you stop it with a lesser amount, maybe $20,000 or even 1/3 of the price at $10,000? Can you really neutralize the Shahed drones? That was what the thing was. You know, coming back to what Zen have been doing there, we have been doing anti-drone systems. We have introduced hard kill options, and we see that currently post the Israel, the focus has almost 2x, minimum 2x from what we were originally projecting.
What are the impact it'll have on our turnover and all that is not yet known. We see that two to three years from now, the mainstay is going to be the anti-drone systems. Second, what has happened is that again, you know, because of the war, the sudden non-existence of wars prior to 2022 and 2020, to now Armenia, Azerbaijan, Ukraine, Russia, Israel, Iran, all these wars have really changed the dynamics very, very well. What has happened in essence is that the companies are now scrambling for preparing for war. It's not the question of if you will be attacked. If you are perceived weak, you will be attacked is the general theory.
How do you make yourself really unbeatable is by, you know, making yourself pre-trained, properly trained, and then, you know, buying the right kind of equipment. What happened? You know, in this direction, we have, I mean, started doing a lot of efforts. One of the biggest change that has happened in terms of our development efforts in the last few years versus last few months, is that the AI has taken a major role into our development cycle. Agent AI takes two places. One is at the level of the, you know, process based. You know, where are the processes? Are you developing software using AI? Secondly, that the embedded level. Are your products themselves, are the simulators, are your anti-drone systems themselves AI native or not?
These are the two areas that we have been focusing on. One thing that happened was that, you know, because of this extraordinary productivity increase, we have suddenly, you know, released a lot of bandwidth in our companies. One of the company that did extremely well is, you know, both ARI and Anawave under Commodore Ahluwalia, and they have started developing really interesting products. And with the bandwidth, we are now able to take more products and holistically address the market that has come. One of the products that they have developed is a cybersecurity suite. This is actually a physical suite that is integrated which can be integrated at, you know, control and command center. It can be integrated into ships.
It can be integrated into, even into aeroplanes where they, you know, if the attack happens through hacking, this can prevent. There are typically, you know, six layers. One is the awareness and training layer, monitoring and intelligence, protection and prevention, encryption and data sovereignty, threat perception, investigation and response, and finally, the quantum, post-quantum readiness, which is required because of the encryption that is required. This is, in all the cases, there are zero foreign dependencies and, you know, it's a proper example of Atmanirbhar Bharat. This is something that is happening. The other thing is that, you know, with the second thing that has, that we have started doing is, of course, the anti-drone simulator. We have been actually supplying the anti-drone system for a long time.
Anti-drone simulator has also been developed by ARI, and this is a very advanced training platform. We really cannot block the actual anti-drone system for training. These actual anti-drone system do have built-in training methodology, but we were requested by the customer that this is a separate activity, and so we have created anti-drone simulator. Again, we think this is a major product. You know, it will teach people to detect, track, and utilize aerial threats. Very realistic virtual environment. It could be a single drone threat or a swarm attack drone. Also can you have a mission-based tactical exercise. This does enable that. You know, of course, scenarios can be configured with adjustable threat levels. This is actually before the war happened.
The war can be simulated and, you know, drones can be activated and stopped from attacking the thing. Again, the current, even the anti-drone system that is there is heavily AI-powered. Again, you know, a lot of AI in that. We, especially when we compare our thing is 15+ Km detection range. Of course, if you network, it goes indefinitely. It can be 4,000 Km or even 40,000 Km. We are talking about each individual system. You know, frequency dominance is one of the biggest challenges that we are seeing worldwide is, that a catch-up game that the other vendors are playing with Zen. Initially in, now recently, we have been supplying 400 MHz to 6 GHz, but that's outdated.
We know that, you know, the bad actors are actually making drones at 100 MHz. They are making at 10 MHz, at 10 GHz. They're making at 12 GHz. What we have done is we have preemptively made the product with wider frequency dominance with 70 MHz to 12 GHz. Our neutralization capabilities are extraordinary. You know, with RF jamming, GNSS jamming, RCWS guns that we have already included. Air defense guns integration has already been both L70 and ZU-23. This product is way ahead of, you know, the, what are they available in the market worldwide. Completely radar itself is also indigenized, and with a range of 20 Km and detects smaller drones much, much earlier than what competition would do.
The latest launch that is again being launched today at Prayagraj, and we are very happy with what is being done. This is actually future-proof at this point in time, and we think that this will a lot of market in the, not only in India, but worldwide. Another product that's being launched today is Vrishabh. Now, Vrishabh is a unmanned ground vehicle, UGV, that is capable of both the capable of combat, logistics, and casualty evacuation. It has a payload of 150 kilos. It goes at a speed of 50 Km/h . The range is up to 100 Km. We have already integrated various weapon systems, MMG, LMG, direct fire, AGS, indirect fire, all of them, and tried on this, and they function very well.
The recoil is absorbed very well. The operating mode is, you know, you can, you know, you can manually operate it, or, you know, you can just on autonomous give a task. Give a task, go there, do this, and come kind of situation can be done. All the way autonomously is there. It has Ackermann steering for better control and reliability. Indigenous content is more than 85%. You know, commercially, we are planning to launch this financial year FY 2027. Of course, you know, these are the other things. It can be used as combat, logistics, or casualty evacuation. This is a command and control center that you see, very interactive and state-of-the-art.
Another product that has been launched in collaboration with Aituring, is our associate company, is that, you know, this is a, this is a unique 30mm ammunition. We have ammunition license. In addition to the recently granted weapon license, we also ammunition license. We are building this ammunition, which is, you know, RF-based programming. It has pre-fragmentation and tungsten ball as the core. You know, we have seen that. We have actually tried it out, and it destroys everything within, in a 10-by-10 meter area. You know, this can also be used as a anti-drone firing thing on our 30mm cannon. This is. Again, when you use this ammunition, you don't have to modify the actual weapon.
You can use the regular weapon system and put this ammunition into that. Well, finally, you know, one more thing that is happening is the CIWS. This is a gun missile system, again by AI, developed in collaboration with AI systems. This can be used by naval forces. In addition to the weapon system, it also has the shorter missile range and a built-in radar. Some of the smaller targets where, you know, people don't want to spend the RFDT, the detection and the jamming, but want to just to have a hard kill option, this built-in radar is a self-contained solution, which will actually at a much lower price point can be pushed to the armed forces.
You know, so again, I, as I was saying, one of the biggest thing that I'm really excited about is the, you know, can we actually make a drone, anti-interceptor drone that is, you know, costing much cheaper than the $30,000, you know, the Shahed drone that cost, and can it effectively. The biggest challenge is, you know, these drones come at 180 Km This Shahed drone does 180 Km. Now the recent ones we hear are doing 300 Km, and the next ones probably would be crossing even that. Given these speeds of, you know, it is very, very difficult to actually realize a drone that can fly at speed of 300 Km.
How do you exactly address this challenge of, you know, stopping a $30,000 drone with much cheaper attack Shahed drone with much cheaper solution? You know, I'm very happy and very proud to announce that we have just come up with similar, with this solution that is actually much cheaper than a Shahed drone. We think at $10,000 is a very good entry point for this. We are launching HyperStrike, which is having a speed of 400 Km/h . You know, it's a five-minute loiter and strike thing, so it is, it can go easily 20 + Km and hit the target. Even if it misses, it can be maneuvered physically.
One thing is it have the AI built in, but at the same time, a manual override is there where it can be chased and it can hit the target. It, again, the proximity variant, payload is about 200 grams. AI-enabled tracking and guidance and 4 kg airframe and mass production-ready. Very, you know, we think that we should be doing about, you know, with the production will start in this financial year of this, and we expect that, you know, even the capacity is about 5,000 per shift or per month. You know, we think we can easily increase to 15,000 and, you know, we can scale it up if the demand goes up.
This is a very, very excitement thing, and there's a small video that, a teaser video that I'll just share with you.
Russia is continuing to use Shahed drones and Lancet kamikaze too.
Latest drone.
This one.
Shahed 136 to create a kamikaze drone squadron.
The drones are believed to be used for target designation. They will fly to target, whereby to crash into the target section.
This was the last slide. With this, you know, of course, as usual, the again, the key contribution for this, the high-speed propulsion system has been supplied by Vector Technics, an extremely competent team again. You know, we actually from the focus on then creating great products which continues to be happen, will continues to happen. Now we are almost in a position of facilitator, having great set of companies working together. Yeah, you know, facilitating them to, you know, unleash their creativity to serve the needs of our clients, the Indian Armed Forces and Indian allies. That is what we have been able to do and very, very excited for the next three to four years.
We think the government is moving very positively. The new DAP, that is, the draft DAP that we saw was very gratifying. The whole focus in the DAP has been IDDM. They have been saying indigenously designed, developed and manufactured. There was some attempt to say that, you know, if the, if even foreign tech, if it is bought, should be used on par with Indian IP developed. The wiser voices prevailed, and I hope that will not be allowed. Because when you develop a product after four or five years of hard work, that's a capability development. It is not a product. If you just get somebody after, you know, from a TOT you say, and you try to equate it with the IDDM, that is dangerous.
You know, what will happen is simply if a company is actually developed a capability and is on verge of commercialization, a foreign counterpart can, what he'll say, "Listen, I want to kill this technology. Take this technology from me and kill that Indian capability, so that, you know, next version onwards, Indian Armed Forces will be forced to come to us." We have to distinguish between foreign designed, developed and Indian assembled or Indian manufactured. Even if the IP, the company is, you know, given the IP, so-called IP transfer has happened, versus indigenously designed, indigenously developed and indigenously manufactured. Indian manufactured. I think that we were smart enough to see the folly in that the distinction and we, I think government will be doing.
I think after 2026, the roost, the complete roost will be ruled by companies that have designed and developed products. you know, I think they may be giving preference, we are hoping, that for indigenous private. There are companies that have developed the product along with the DRDO. What are the differences? DRDO actually finances the development. compare that with a company that is actually self-funding the innovation and R&D. you know, we are saying that privately self-funded, independent R&D companies, you know, innovation and R&D companies should be actually treated much better than people who are just taking co-developing with DRDO and that we call it. If that happen, that should happen.
Anyway, we can distinctly see companies that are putting in their money, that's the ultimate skin in the game and they are saying that, "Listen, we want to develop this product. We don't want any funding." If we click, you buy. The only thing for those companies is quicker orders. If that is cracked by the Indian government, which we think is the main point in 2026, that they are going to, you know, really push the IDDM agenda. I think that'll change. 2026 will be a hallmark year, not for the actual innovators in defense industry, but also for the Indian Armed Forces, which will unleash the power of Indian Armed Force, Indian industry, not only into India, but all worldwide.
With that, I thank you so much, and I will hand it over to Mr. Hari Haran for the presentation on the financial results.
Thank you, sir. Good morning and warm welcome to all. Thank you for joining us on our Q4 FY 2026 earnings call. Following Mr. Ashok's remarks on the business and the way forward, I will take you through our financial performance for the quarter and for the year ended 31st March 2026. Let me begin with the consolidated performance for the quarter. Consolidated revenues for Q4 FY 2026 stood at INR 178.1 crores, broadly in line with the INR 177.8 crores reported in Q3 FY 2026, and lower by 45.2% year-on-year compared to the INR 325 crores in Q4 FY 2025.
As we have indicated through the year, the revenue trajectory in FY 2026 has been impacted by the timing of order inflows, with the bulk of the orders received over the past several months scheduled for execution from FY 2027 onwards. Operational EBITDA for the quarter stood at INR 51 crores, which translates to an operational EBITDA margin of 28.6%, lower by approximately 900 basis points sequentially and 1,390 basis points year-on-year. Profit after tax for the quarter stood at INR 47.2 crores. PAT as a percentage of revenues stood at 26.5%. I would like to spend a moment on the five specific factors that have weighed on the margins profile for this quarter, since the quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year movements are wider than the underlying business run rate would suggest.
First, our Q4 revenue base is lower against the prior year comparable with Q4 FY 2025, having strong execution resulting in a higher base. Since a significant portion of our cost base, both at the standalone level and across the group, is fixed in nature, this lower revenue base translates into margin compression, particularly on the year-on-year comparison. Second, we recognized year-end performance incentives for certain employees during the quarter. This has resulted in an incremental employee cost of approximately INR 5 crores sequentially. Third, we have updated our warranty provisioning percentages, particularly for anti-drone system products supplied in FY 2025 based on the actual expense data. With more actual data now available on warranty utilization for these products, we have revised our provisioning estimates upward, resulting in approximately INR 3.1 crores of incremental warranty expense in the quarter.
We incurred approximately INR 2.7 crores of post-supply expenses during the quarter pertaining to an export order delivered in FY 2026. These costs include on-ground installation support, logistics and engagement of external consultants in the customer's geography. Fifth, R&D expenses for the quarter were higher by approximately INR 3.3 crores sequentially. This reflects investments into our future product portfolio. As we have indicated in earlier interactions, we expect to make higher investments in R&D going forward, which will be reflected in an elevated cost base. Unlike the other four factors mentioned earlier, which are largely one-time or period specific in nature, this is a structural commitment that we will continue. While these factors are weighted on the quarterly margins, our long-term guidance of 35% operational EBITDA and 25% PAT margins remain intact. Coming to the consolidated performance for the full year.
Consolidated revenues for FY 2026 stood at INR 687.7 crores, lower by 29.4% as against INR 973.6 crores in FY 2025. Operational EBITDA for the year stood at INR 247.2 crores at a margin of 35.95%, lower by approximately 240 basis points year-on-year. Profit after tax for the year stood at INR 217.9 crores. PAT as a percentage of revenues stood at 31.7%. Now, coming to the order book. The consolidated order book stood at INR 1,336 crores as on 31st March 2026. The standalone order book as of 31st March 2026 stood at INR 1,222.6 crores.
Majority of this order book is scheduled for execution from FY 2027 onwards and provides clear revenue visibility for the next financial year. Working capital days as of 31st March , 2026 is 196 days compared to 194 days as at end of Q3 FY 2026. I would like to draw your attention to a notable improvement in our DSO position. Our days sales outstanding at the end of FY 2026 stood at approximately 119 days compared to 161 days at 31st December , 2025, an improvement of 42 days. The increase in the working capital days is primarily due to higher inventory days and advances to suppliers, which is required for the projects which are currently being executed for deliveries in FY 2027. The liquidity position of the group continues to remain strong.
Cash and bank balances aggregated to INR 1,308 crores as of 31st March 2026. The group remains debt-free. This is the brief on our financial performance for the quarter and the year. We can now take questions. Thank you.
Thank you so much. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin with the question- and- answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may click on the Raise Hand icon from the Participants tab on your screen. We request participants to restrict to two questions and then return to the queue for more questions.
We'll take our first question from Mehul Panjwani of 40 Cents. Mehul, please go ahead with your question.
Hello, sir. Thank you so much for the opportunity and elaborate walkthrough of the products. My first question is, how much of the INR 1,336 crore order book which we have will convert into FY 2027 revenue, and by when will it happen in FY 2027?
Thank you for your question, Mr. Mehul. Most of the order book that we have, of INR 1,336 crores, out of that, the product, which will be dispatched in FY 2027 is around INR 1,000 crores. The balance, INR 326 crores is basically AMC revenue, and the AMC revenue gets spread over a period of the AMC contract. Out of the total order book, INR 1,000 crores is expected to be executed. Most of the execution is going to happen in Q2 and Q3 of FY 2027.
Okay. Most likely we'll recognize the entire order book into revenue?
Yes.
Okay. My second question, sir, is what is the sustainability of new orders in FY 2027 across the new and legacy product portfolio?
I think, the orders will be accelerated now. We expect, both the segment, the simulation segment and the anti-drone segment to really increase in the size of the orders. You know, as I said that the demand which we were expecting has far exceeded the estimate. The reality is much larger than what we had expected. You know, the sustainability of the order is not only, you know, it not only sustainable, there's going to be a significant increase in the orders that will be received during this year, the financial year 2027.
Sir, can you give some kind of a ballpark how much increase would we compared to FY 2026?
We stick to that prediction of, you know, our projection of INR 4,000 crores turnover in FY 2027 and 2028 put together. We are very comfortable with those figures now.
Okay, sir. Okay. Thank you so much, and wish you the very best.
Thank you, Mehul.
Thank you so much. We'll take our next question from Darshil Jhaveri of Crown Capital. Darshil, please unmute. Yes.
Hello. Yeah, yeah, good morning, sir. Thank you so much for taking my question, sir. Just a bit in regards to the previous participant question only. We are sticking to the INR 4,000 crores revenue guidance. Mathematically that means in FY 2028 we'll be roughly doing around INR 3,000 crores, and for that we would need at least INR 3,000 crores, INR 3,000 crores-INR 4,000 crores maybe order to book by this year. Is that fair? That's what we are targeting this year? Very honestly, sir, we've been trying to in previous calls we've guided that maybe we'll do INR 1,500 crores, INR 2,000 crores orders in hand. We are nearby that, it's still to reach INR 3,000 crores is still quite far numbers.
How confident are we that we'll get INR 3,000 crore order in this year?
You know, what we are saying is, you know, cumulatively we will be doing INR 4,000 crores. You know, If you are right in the sense, will we be by the year end, will we be having a INR 3,000 crore order book to, you know, achieve it, even if we were to do INR 2,500 in FY 2028. I think, that should be the case if, you know, based on what we have been talking to you. Again, you know, what I would like to say is in terms of execution, we should be able to execute INR 4,000 crores cumulative in over the both the years. Will the order book stand at INR 3,000 crores at any point in time?
I think it is reasonable to expect that, yes, it should, order book should touch INR 3,000 crores at some point in time.
Okay. Fair enough. Fair enough, sir. I just wanted to know, like, I think we got recently. Sorry, I missed the start of the call. I joined in a bit late. We got, I think, a new segment in ammunition and everything. Are these, are the guidance they are including these or, that's a complete new segment where, you know, revenues can touch new highs, sir?
You know, part of the, you know, the sales might be, it might include part of the sales of the, you know, arms licenses that we are expecting, but it will not be very significant to, you know, really contribute meaningfully to these figures till the, in the first two years. I think third year onwards they will start contributing very significantly.
Okay. Fair enough. Sir, just last question from my end. Right now, like, because lot of geopolitical anti-drone systems are, you know, are required a lot of forefront. How is our technology, you know, catching up with people? Like, if you would, if I would compare ourself to, like, all over the world, how would you rate us? Like, maybe top 10, top 15. Why I'm asking that, because the technology is advancing so much, what are the possibilities of export orders? Domestic, as we know, government is not in our hands, right? Like, it's going to take some time. There is going to be multiple rounds. Maybe it gets delayed even further. Exports is something, you know, we could, you know, because there's a lot of requirement due to the multiple wars.
How are our products placed and what can we expect out of exports in the coming years?
I think we have, you know, factored exports also in this. You know, we personally think that the simulator market is, you know, showing a lot of hope, especially with related to drone-related, anti-drone related simulation. The naval simulation is big. Thanks to, you know, Strait of Hormuz, everybody wants to know how to navigate difficult places, how to handle mines, all these things. You really can't practice unless you're on a simulator. How do you handle mines? How do you clean mines, clear mines, et cetera? The simulator market is really becoming. As I said, everyone, if you are perceived as weak, you are the next target. How do you look strong is by having a very, very well-trained force. The simulator is bigger.
This is what we are getting based on the inquiries, incoming inquiries also. Of course, in anti-drone system, I really don't want to tell much about it, because this was a system that was used effectively in Operation Sindoor. You know, we think that it's a proven product. What we have today is much, much more advanced than what we gave to the armed forces then. It's a highly evolved system, and I think it's definitely in the top three in the world, if not, you know, the absolute top. When we go to the exhibitions and we consult other vendors and we talk to the customers, they're actually quite surprised that, you know, India actually has the ability to, you know, you know, detect and jam from 70 Mhz all the way up to 12 Ghz.
That's a huge range for any product. Yes, I think export market is going to play a major role, and we are expecting a lot of export orders, yeah.
By when will we get some order? Our execution mostly going to be Q3, Q4, can we have order flows before that or do we expect orders to also be back ended, sir?
No, no, I think we have to.
Like, what's the pipeline, if you can say, sir? Yeah.
You know, pipeline would be very large, but I don't want to touch that. You know, I think, as you know, we had told last year also that, you know, we are expecting some orders in the first quarter. Though the orders are very near, I think when they come, your confidence as a, you know, and our confidence will go up about the targets that we have been talking about. Yes, the, otherwise the pipelines, pipeline for both the simulators and the anti-drone system is very, very large. I mean, running into a few thousands of crores.
Oh, okay. Fair, fair. That's it from my side. I'll join back. Thank you so much.
Thanks, Darshil.
Thanks, Darshil.
Thank you so much. We'll take our next question from the line of Amit Dixit of ICICI Securities. Amit, please unmute your microphone.
Yeah, hi. Good morning everyone, thanks for the opportunity, sir. Congratulations for a good order inflow and the pipeline that we have. A couple of questions, sir. One from a more conceptual perspective. While we all talk about IDDM and the focus of government on indigenization, but if you look at the current AONs, they have been at a record level this year. You know, the foreign component, foreign procurement component, and I'm not counting Rafale here, Rafale is a different thing altogether, has gone up quite high. It seems the view among armed forces, at least as per our channel checks, is that they would like to go for instant patch up rather than, you know, waiting for indigenized kind of systems that might take their time.
In that context, order inflow or orders in the near term, you know, there's just a risk that they might be more, you know, towards for the foreign guys. What is your thought on that?
I mean, you know, you know, I don't know if you have seen The Godfather. You know, in The Godfather, Don Vito Corleone tells Michael Corleone that, you know, "Whoever comes with this bargaining propo- is the traitor. Whoever comes with the bargaining proposal." He says, "Whoever brings that proposal, you know, you have to, you will know that he's the traitor." You know, similarly, I think, in Indian armed forces, you know, whenever anybody is actually pitching a solution that's especially available in India and likely to be available in India, they're actually traitors. We need to be very, very careful, and we are the...
By the way, the whole political system, the whole bureaucratic system, and the, you know, majority of the political, majority of the bureaucratic, majority of the armed forces are completely online with getting indigenous. You know, one of the questions they say, the pitch they make is, "Listen, you have to have the best equipment in the world to win a war." Remember, this is the exact situation that we. Today, 20 years back, we were in that exact situation that we'd always say that we'll buy it from outside, we'll not develop it in-house, and we were completely unprepared for wars. Now the situation is. You know, the country that said, "Listen, I'm not going to buy anything from foreign countries.
Even if a product is 60% of the be- for world's best product, I will go with the my country's product. Which was that country? That was Israel. He, they have been on record. Where are, where is Israel compared to India today, which have been following the policy of only indigenous equipment? You know, the, I think that sense is there within the government that, you know, we need to buy as much Indian as possible. You know, but again, you know, we don't have a Rafale, we don't have a, you know, Predator, which, you know, I, even though I have my own reservations whether they are the right kind of expenditure at this point in time. You know, but we don't have them.
You know, going for them with the foreign vendors is all right. There are a lot of things. You know, again, to your question about the allocation of funds, because the very large ticket items, those have happened. In the ground, I can actually see they're actually saying that, you know, we have to buy by Indian IDDM, and they are willing to take risks where, you know, they say, "Okay, if they let us give orders to their 10 vendor," they'll say, "Okay, three vendors take these orders." They are I think there will be a consolidation phase happening in the next three to five years, where some companies will really be, emerge as winners, the Googles or the, you know, Amazons of the defense world, that will benefit from focus on indigenous R&D.
Yeah. I don't know whether I answered your question, Amit, but if I haven't, please highlight it.
No, sir, absolutely, thanks for invoking The Godfather. I remember after quite some time, yeah. The second question is essentially on the product that you showed in the beginning of the presentation. Drone, quite, I would say, impressive. Given the use case is very, very huge in the Indian market, and the specifications that you highlighted, I think they are ahead of your peers, at least what I have studied. You know, what kind of, I mean, I'm not talking about one year, two year. I'm talking about the use case in particular that, let us say, five years. What kind of, you know, opportunity do we see in India? Part B of the question is on naval simulation that you highlighted in the presentation. What kind of solutions we are developing over there?
This is A and Bs. You can handle these.
You know, you know, very frankly, if, you know, that, the thing that we are doing, you know, the point here is that, you know, while we are developing this, there is somebody who's developing a better, you know, Shahed or something like that. We have a version that will address the future things also as we in the works, in addition to the 400 Km, intercepted drone that we have created. This intercepted drone has AI vision compute power on the drone. It can go autonomously, go after it. You know, Shahed drones, most of Shahed drones are 180 Km. This could, even if it misses, go back, tap, you know, blow, blast it out of existence, the intercepted drone.
We think that, you know, if things look as they are, the world is a very dynamic place, Amit, this may be the largest product in our portfolio two years from now. The biggest product in our portfolio, the intercepted drone. Okay. You know, as we are evolving the future versions of that, this could not only be the Indian Armed Forces, but worldwide, this may be the most sought after product. Again, the kind of research that is going on is on the absolute edge of physics and reality. If we are able to crack it, this will be absolute. There will nobody in the world who will be able to achieve what we have achieved. I think it's a very big, a good view. You caught onto it.
The intercepted drone, with 400 Km speed, with AI compute edge, you know, and complete autonomous is going to be a very big thing for us. Yeah. To your question of second, you know, naval simulation, how. You know, naval simulation is really big for us. You know, we are thinking that the government is, you know, the Indian government is really, really focused on, you know, now. You know, a lot of people just focus on the two borders, you know, the Chinese border and the Pakistani border.
When you just, you know, just have a map in front of you and move it around, you know, about as you move it upside down, you will see the sea is such a huge part of India, and it's where we have built everything. This is where the actual threats are now being built. You know, what are we going to do about it? You know, I think the training for that is going to be very, very major. Thanks to the, you know, the choke point that we are seeing, India will have a larger role to play as we go ahead. We see in the naval simulation also, we have started putting in effort and started offering complete full-fledged combat, naval combat training centers.
There is lot of positive response in this regard, not only in India, but, you know, the ARI, our 100% subsidiary, have lot of connections in South America and, you know, Europe. We are trying to push those solutions through them. I think, and, you know, I think, this is going to be quite a large contributor of revenues as we go ahead.
No, sir. Thanks. Thanks indeed. I think that I will connect with you one-on-one, because this is, like, outside the domain of this call within the interest of time. I will, yeah, connect with you one-on-one on these exciting products. Thank you, and all the best.
Sure, Amit. Thank you so much. Just for the knowledge of everyone, you know, these products are being demonstrated at Prayagraj. They are on display, you can go and have a look there, yeah. Yes, please. Next question.
Thank you so much, sir. Thank you. We'll take our next question from Dipen Vakil of PhillipCapital. Dipen, please go ahead.
Hi, sir. Good morning, and thank you for this opportunity. My first question is regarding your arms license that you have received. Can you tell us the scope for Zen Technologies in this arms manufacturing as to whether we are getting into the ammunition production or whether it is more about the product that you recent just on display right now? As to what kind of new product we are expecting from this arms and basically from this arms manufacturing license.
Yeah. You know, the thing is that again, we have been focused on the anti-drone segment by itself. What is happening is we built the remote control weapon station as an, you know, as an expansion of our Hard-kill option offering to the customers. What we saw was that, you know, the product by themselves are having a lot of market. You know, the anti-remote control weapon station, they say, "We don't want your anti-drone solution. We want this thing maybe integrated with a radar kind of thing." Those are the kind of solution that some of the, you know, especially the vendors with limited budgets are asking for.
An interesting thing was that when we saw in the, which we anticipated much earlier was that these, the 12.7mm, 20mm, 30mm especially, these will be the weapon system that will be used to bring down the drones. We had applied two years back the licenses, which fortunately came in now. In the meantime, we have been developing, doing some work, some hardware work also on creating these weapon systems. Yes, the weapon systems will be launched during the, one, something will be launched during this year. Next year, I think the majority of them will be launched. These are very big market. Again, as you have probably guessed it, the bigger market in this is the actual ammunition.
The ammunition that we have developed for 30 mm, that is the most preferred caliber weapon for to bring down the drones. The 30 mm is actually a smart, you know, ammunition. The airburst capability, when it detects something from drones, decide it does the blast and 10- by- 10 by-1 0 meters worth of, you know, if drones anywhere in that radius will be completely destroyed. I think, yes, ammunition is also a very big market, but we are going after smart ammunition, not the dumb ammunition where, you know, they. Again, you know, we are addicted to margins, so we have to have reasonable margins to do this kind of thing.
Yes, I think, both arms and the ammunition will be a big market for us, and we look forward to making a dent in that market.
Got it, sir. Thank you so much for that clarification. Sir, second question is on the line of the order inflow, the kind of order inflow. You told us about that INR 4,000 crore of turnover cumulative in FY 2027/2028. One thing I want to understand is that what is your conversion rate in terms of from order win to execution? If it is something like one year, then potentially all those INR 3,000 crore of order wins has to be won in FY 2027. That is one thing that I want to understand. What was the bottleneck which led to the delay in the terms of ordering? As you mentioned, rightly mentioned, ADS and simulation are right now something which are widely required, and the requirement is only increasing going ahead.
Any indication as to what led to the bottleneck and to slow ordering activity from the government side as well?
You asked two question. One is, you know, when are we going to get the orders? Will it be during the year so that we get a comfort that, you know, there'll be some significant part of the INR 4,000 crore executed during the current year? I think, yeah, that is the answer. The short answer is we expect the orders to come. You know, in fact, this first quarter should be a good quarter, but not later than second quarter. I think for you should hear some good news in the first quarter, which will give you comfort about the current year. Yes, you know, as we go towards the end of the year, you will get the visibility for the second year also.
Again, you know, I'm a big picture person. We try to look at the very large, especially for long term. These are, we are keep adding the arms, the ammunition, the interceptor drones, you know, the cyber security Suraksha that we are calling. All these things are coming in. I think they're going to be big. Yeah, so to your question, what are the bottleneck that caused the orders not to come in at this point of. Again, I have touched upon this earlier, which is the simulator orders that were supposed to come, they got delayed because of the operation that happened, the Crisis Operation Sindoor.
Government went slow on the regular procurement and really accelerated and did emergency procurement of the anti-drone systems and all the placed order. Those orders did come to us. You know, that kind of helped us build up our order book position. The things that we were prepared for, the actual simulators and all that, they got a little bumped, you know, little delayed because of that. We again, we are. Those are the orders we think that we should be getting very soon.
Got it, sir. Got it. Thank you so much for answering my questions and all-
Thank you, Dipen.
Thank you. Yeah.
Thank you. We'll take our next question from Vikash Singh of ICICI Securities. Vikash, please go ahead.
Okay. Thank you for the opportunity. Sir, just wanted to understand, as we are translating from a software only to now a mix of a hardware as well, where usually the margin profile is slightly lower. How should we look at our FY 2027/2028 margins going forward as more and more hardware-related product would gets added on?
Because, you know, we are, primarily, you know, in all our products, in all our simulators, hardware is a major part of it. Only thing is that we used to outsource our hardware. We used to design, develop, and prototype it. Then for the actual manufacturing, for the non-critical items, we have always outsourced it. We have never developed it because, you know, we would finally assemble it at our location, quality test it, and dispatch it to the customer. Hardware has been essential part of all our product simulator. For example, a tank simulator, the whole of the tank has to be replicated up to millimeter accuracy.
Mm.
There's a lot of hardware part. We continue to have hardware. We have hardware and our software is also there. Of course, now developing the software has become much easier. I think the margins will continue as long as we are actually providing lot of value to the customer. You know, in the sense when I say value, they'll definitely want to be the. For number one, they need this product. Number one, they want to be the cheapest in the world. Typically for our product, we have mostly competition from foreign companies. We ensure that, you know, we are the best priced value for money deal for them.
At this point in time, I don't see any threat to our margin you know, prediction of our 25% PAT and 35% EBITDA margins. I think we're very comfortable with the 35% target. I think for this next couple of years that margin profile should continue.
Noted, sir. Sir, also give us some, you know, insight into your working capital, since now you are going into an ammunition department as well, where we see that the, you know, working capital runs into over one year or so. How should we look at our capital requirement and the fundings?
You know, the ammunition and the arms, they are a little away for us. I think the next year will be the earliest year where we'll have to start putting the working capital on that. Overall working capital, you know, I'll let Hari answer that question on, you know, how are we managing the working capital, and if there is a future increased need for working capital, how do we plan to address it? Hari will address that, yeah.
Yeah. Currently, our working capital is on 196 days. Even with the manufacturing license, like, Ashok sir had mentioned, the plan is that we will stick to our existing manufacturing model, wherein we outsource most of the production and then, be an assembler. Only the critical components that we need for these, arms will be manufactured in-house. In the, in the long term, we still expect our working capital cycle to be around what we've guided of 140-150 days. If there are, major orders to be executed, like it is the case right now, where we are seeing inventory build up for the executions which happen in the next 12 months, the working capital days will slightly increase, like it is the case right now.
Otherwise, it should be comfortably around 140-150 days.
Noted, sir. That's all from my side, and all the best in future.
Yeah.
Thank you. We'll take our next question from Mohit Lohia of DAM Capital. Mohit, please go ahead.
Yeah, hi. Thanks for the opportunity. If you can just talk about performance at subsidiaries level and also the guidance.
Subsidiaries, currently, as you see, the overall consolidated revenue is INR 688 crores. The standalone is INR 423. The subsidiaries have contributed INR 60 crores in the current year. Majority of that revenue is coming from two of our subsidiaries, which is UTS and ARI. ARI, as you would be aware, we acquired in FY 2025, so the full year consolidation happened in this year. ARI has contributed around INR 131 crores to the top line. And the net PAT margin of ARI is around 30.3%. UTS has contributed the remaining, and other subsidiaries have contributed around INR 10 crores. UTS margins are, PAT margins are around 26.5% for the full year.
From a guidance point of view, we think, in FY 2027, UTS and ARI together, they would be doing around INR 365 crores of revenue.
Sir, on margin front?
Margins will remain the same region, Mohit, like the current margins which I have mentioned, ARI and UTS. UTS will be at around 26%-27% to 30%, and UTS will be similarly close to 30%-31%.
Sure, sir. Thank you. That's it from my side.
Thank you. We have Prerit Jain of Motilal Oswal with his question. Prerit, please unmute your microphone. Yes.
Hi. Yes, thank you for the opportunity. My first question is regarding the order book of subsidiaries. Can you please tell us what was the opening and closing order book of both ARI and UTS for FY 2026?
As at 31st March 2026, ARI had around INR 70 crores in order book, and UTS had around INR 35 crores in order book. That's the closing order book for the year.
What was the opening order book for the same?
Opening order book for both UTS and ARI together, UTS was INR 110 crores, and ARI was around INR 90 crores.
Okay. Got it. What kind of order inflow visibility do we have for these two entities for, let's say, next two years?
Prerit, like I mentioned in the earlier conversation, we expect both of them together to do around INR 365 crores of revenue in next 12 months. That's the target. Beyond that, I think we've guided that ARI would in FY 2028, we're expecting ARI to do around INR 300 crores, and UTS would be anywhere between INR 150 crores-INR 200 crores.
Okay. Okay, got it. That's all from my side. Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you so much. We are taking our next question from Harshit Kapadia of Elara Capital. Harshit, please go ahead with your question.
Yeah, hi. Good morning, and thanks for the opportunity. You know, good order inflows in Q4. I just wanted to check with you, sir. Where are we in terms of stage for the Hard-kill anti-drone system clearance? Have the user trials been done? Are we expecting orders for the Hard-kill as well? Secondary, there was the post the Operation Sindoor, we were expecting the additional orders to come for our anti-drone system. Have we gotten this in FY 2026, or are we expecting things to come in FY 2027?
Hi, Harshit. The Hard-kill orders we already received. We have started receiving them. We have got about INR 40 crores worth. Earlier also, we have supplied with Hard-kill of ZU, the L70 we have supplied, and now recently also two more orders have been received. Yes, Hard-kill orders we have started getting in. With respect to after the Operation Sindoor, because of that, the orders were accelerated because then we got some feedback that these are the things that need to be improved, and we based on the actual input that we got. We got orders to both repeat orders as well as orders to upgrade the existing systems.
These were the orders which were received very, very fast, and, the work is being done as we speak on those, orders that we have received, you know, due to the, lessons from, Operation Sindoor.
Sir, at the start of the call you mentioned that you have already built out for some few thousand INR crore of order inflow. First of all, can you quantify a number here, and is this all on nomination or all competitive? How much of is a win rate that we can expect? If you can give some clarity in terms of, you know, the order pipeline, giving more confidence to investors on where are we in terms of, you know, let's say a INR 3,000 crore, INR 4,000 crore is where we are in terms of bidding pipeline. That would be of great help.
You know, in terms of bidding, we are at, I would say probably in the region of about INR 1,500 crores or so. The other, you know, there may be, you know, single vendor tenders and all that. When we add that up, that could be another INR 2,000 crores. Yeah. You know, all together it's much, much larger where, you know, there may be a regular tender may be floated, which may take a longer time, something like 18 months. Overall, the pipeline is running into a few thousands of crores.
How much of the split will be between counter-drone system and simulator within the pipeline, sir?
We think, you know, when we look at the split at this point in time, it does look favorable to anti-drone system. You know, probably 55, 45 kind of thing.
Lastly, sir, on the ammunition part. You'll develop a product, it will go for testing, and then you will start supplying. Is that how the process would be? It will take how long according to you for this 30 mm ammunition that you plan to do?
Yeah. Next year we should be, we should have started manufacturing and supplying it.
Okay. You don't require a lot of certifications or those kind of approvals for this.
We are, actually, as we speak, the testing is going on. The certifying agency is also in the loop about it. I think by next financial year, definitely we should be started manufacturing it. I mean, you are right. The nightmare. Somebody did say that it's much more complex than you can imagine. We think that a two-year period should be sufficient for us to get everything in order.
Lastly, any acquisition that you plan to do on the simulator side, maybe to complete the portfolio of simulator? Is there any one thing on cards for this financial year?
Harshit, we have identified, you know, you know, just the background is that, you know, we have been anti-diversification for almost 25 years of our life. We were doing nothing, but we're just doing army simulators. We, you know, we got into this field because there was nobody. Everybody was talking about drones, but nobody sensed the danger the drones represent. We had a four-five year lead over competing companies and when we started doing the R&D. Yes, I think we have the things. You know, somewhere in the last couple of years, we have started thinking that we should focus on Pareto technologies. Technologies three or four years from now will become very important, and that will be and those will determine...
You know, Pareto is basically 20% of the technology that determines 80% of the war. For example, in the Israel-Iran war, we know that the Shahed was the winner. Absolutely. And as you know that this is recursive, the Pareto is recursive. You know, the 20% of 20% of 20% is 0.8% can determine the result of, you know, 80% of 80% of 80%, which is 51.2%. You know, this actually happens. We are trying to locate what are those key technologies which we can actually have a head start and try to get into. In addition to not only simulator, but we are looking at those companies.
You know, we can supply the capital, but we don't have the bandwidth or the technical intelligence to do the thing. One thing we do because we are so familiar with the whole ecosystem, we can guide them in the right way by putting in the resources. Typically what we have seen in the smaller companies is they are dispersed over too many opportunities and, you know, they're existing. Guys are killing them saying, you know, "What's going to the next quarter turnover?" Zen comes in there and he says, "Listen, let us stop all the, you know, 15 projects you're doing. The 16th one looks interesting. Let us put in all our resources and create a world-class technology there." That is where we are trying to, you know, we are looking at.
To your question, to a long question, short answer is that, yeah, we are looking at acquisitions. We are looking in both simulation anti-drone systems. Some Pareto technologies for the future, if we find is very important, we'll be acquiring those companies too.
Okay, sir. Yeah. Wishing you all the best, sir. Thank you.
Thank you, Harshit.
Thank you.
Thank you so much. Ladies and gentlemen, due to paucity of time, we will take that as the last question for today. I now hand over the call to Ashok, Sir, for his closing remarks. Over to you, Sir.
Thank you. Thank you, Swapnil. You know, again, you know, you know, one of the favorite songs of, you know, yesteryears was, "Ae Mere Watan Ke Logon Tum Khoon Karo Kurbaani" by Lata Mangeshkar. That's actually not my favorite song. I don't like that song. In a way, you know, why should my soldiers give Kurbaani? Why should my soldiers die? You know, whenever even a single soldier dies, a part of us dies, part of me dies. I think all of us feel that. Why should we let our soldiers die? I don't like the song in the sense Kurbaani, if somebody has to give, let the opposite sides give the Kurbaani. Why should we give the Kurbaani? You know, I don't like that, you know, even one of our soldier dies.
How do we enable a complete defense system where, you know, there is less of human life? How do we automate it? How do you create more robots? How do you automate the thing? Is what I'm saying. You know, if Shahed comes to our border, our responsibility and promise to Shahed is that we'll make it Shaheed. You know, I think that is the kind of confidence, whether it is soldier or a drone, it should not enter our system, and with minimum damage at our side. With that objective in mind, with that target in mind, I would like to thank you so much for, you know, staying with Zen as investors. You know, I think the long-term story is very, very strong and very, very intact.
I look forward to more interactions with you. Again, to the key investors, please come and see what is happening in Hyderabad. Interact, coordinate with our CFO, Hari, and have a look at what's happening in the cutting edge of reality. Thank you so much.
Thank you. On behalf of Zen Technologies Limited, that concludes today's conference call. Thank you for joining us, and you may now click on the leave icon to exit the meeting. Thank you all for your participation.