People like Bhutan are jumping into it. If this whole COVID relapse had not happened, and you can go off camera, I would have actually expected a significant acceleration. This relapse, I don't think that any plans that have already been announced by countries will actually go into limbo.
While the good news is that post-COVID relaxation, countries did start issuing RFPs and what have you, and there are many countries that have actually invited us to come and make presentations. The fact of the matter is that it takes its own sweet time. You know, implementing a regulatory filing platform is like a generational shift for a country.
We had started applying, we'd started sending out our proposals to various countries and things had started. When this whole thing happened in the last week or so, I hope it doesn't slow anything down. Bhutan is in the bag. The reason we have not announced the amount is because it's a bit of a rolling, it's a bit of a moving number.
You see, Kamath, in the world of compliance, while the core application for receiving the data, I can tell you what that costs. There is the level of integration and other things that actually go at the back end, where it's difficult to estimate a cost right at the beginning itself. We will actually make a trip to Bhutan in the next couple of weeks.
Unless, of course, the country shuts down, which I don't think will happen. Where we will have a better understanding as to what the value of the project will be. If I give you a range, you will basically come back and tell me, "Why are you giving me a range?" Might as well not give you a range at this point in time.
We will hopefully have something in place, something soon in terms of number, in terms of what the value of Bhutan will be. If you remember, not just the last call, the previous call, I said we have about four different bits that we've actually put in place. Siddesh, you need to respond a bit promptly for people who are asking for entry instead of it coming to me.
I understand. Yeah.
Please, Siddesh. Rajesh, welcome. So far what I basically said was, Bhutan's in the bag, other countries yet to make up their minds. We are hoping it will happen soon. We're expecting some traction to happen by March end.
Your guess is as good as mine because the whole regulatory compliance platform business depends on not only the whims and fancies of the regulator, but also the ability to get funding. The Bhutan project is funded partly by the World Bank and by the Bhutanese government. From what I know, I think it's 60% funded by the World Bank and 40% by the Bhutanese government. I think the 60% Bhutan, 60% World Bank thing is, they've already tied up.
The larger thing is what they need to tie up, is what they need to tie up internally. Bhutan also depends on India for a lot of these things, so it's quite possible that India might jump in. I have no idea at this point in time. I will have more to offer in the days ahead. The value of the Bhutan contract will not be very different from any other regulatory implementations in any significant fashion.
Having said that, the system integration part and other things go along with is where the variability is. What we also want to do today is to basically, show you a couple of products that we have launched recently, each of which could actually be very useful to you in terms of XBRL, data consumption.
Some of you may be aware that SEBI is now looking at expanding the scope of XBRL compliance more and more and more. Already the ESG reports are being submitted in XBRL. All of these things open up more opportunities for us in the create part of our business. The first part of the business is the collect part. This is where the Bhutan thing comes in.
The create part is where the new opportunities will come on account of filing mandates. The filing mandate in Europe in terms of energy sector, Anu will talk about it. There was also an XBRL Asia conference that was held in Bombay recently, where most of the participants turned out to be our clients, which was very good for us. Therefore, we could flex our muscles in front of the international XBRL community. That's again something that Anu will talk about. Before I say anything else, Siddesh, are you letting VP Rajesh in?
I think he have some technical issue. I'm admitting it, but he's getting error. I'm just getting in touch with him on the phone.
Thank you. Anu, if you could just share with us two things. One is what's happening with the FERC next phase mandate, and also the carry-aways from the XBRL conference that happened in Bombay recently. If you could do both, that'll be grateful.
Okay, great. I'll start with the FERC overall mandate. This is actually applicable for all energy companies. The phase 1 of the mandate started off last year and, close to approximately 800 companies they had to comply with this mandate. The phase 2 of the mandate, what we hear is, close to 3,000 entities will have to comply with XBRL reporting.
You know, I kind of visit U.S. two, three months before. You know, I also got the opportunity to meet with the representative who's responsible for XBRL implementation at the FERC, which is the energy regulator. As per him, there could be more guidelines which would come, you know, in 2023, early 2023 around, you know, mandate like that. That's more like, you know, informal communication that we got, but we are hoping that there'll be more official communication coming from the FERC, you know, next year, early next year.
When do you see that happening, Anu? When do you see the mandate kicking off?
That information, they haven't kind of clearly given any dates or a timeframe. You know, usually what happens is once the mandate is announced, usually the regulator themselves, depending on, you know, how much. There are various steps, right? Once the regulator announces a mandate, there is a taxonomy that needs to be released.
The taxonomy goes through various iterations and stuff like that. Software have to be kind of developed. From when the mandate is announced, maybe one and a half years or two years is the timeframe from when the mandate rollout kicks in. You know, if, you know, as for this conversation, if you are even expecting something, let's say, quarter 2nd quarter next year.
I think that itself will be a good, you know, next rollout for this more, you know, broader scope of reporting that more entities will be covered under this.
Just so that you're aware, the FERC phase two reporting, we have not factored in our internal revenue budgets going forward. The internal revenue budgets going forward, we've seen growth come largely from iFile implementations. That's the collect implementation in different parts of the world. The FERC thing, if it happens sooner, will actually be a positive surprise for us as opposed to it being postponed, which will be neutral. It doesn't matter because it's not even being factored into the numbers at this point in time. Anu.
Okay. That was on the FERC overall, you know, rollout. Separately, if you see in the U.S. there's also a big, you know, reporting which is called the climate reporting, which is going to kind of come up, you know, which is around. There also we're kind of seeing that SEC will kind of, you know, start making announcements, maybe next year.
Those are kind of very early stages. What we're kind of anticipating is this FERC will be one very important, you know, opportunity to come up. Secondly, this is on the overall XBRL Asia Roundtable Conference, which was held in Mumbai. This was again last month. This, this is primarily a regulatory event, where different regulators from Asia had kind of participated.
This is an opportunity regulators and, you know, agencies who want to implement XBRL as a standard present. This conference was kind of very well attended. There were, you know, representatives from RBI, SEBI, NSE and you know, various exchanges, central banks, you know, so on and so forth. One very interesting in the event is of course there were presentations from the different regulators.
There were, I think, close to five, six regulators that were kind of invited to kind of present. There was, for example, a Securities Commission from Malaysia. You know, there was a, you know, Jordan Securities Commission, there was, Oman Capital Markets Authority, you know, Taiwan Stock Exchange and RBI who were, who were invited to present at this event.
Out of these five regulators, if you see, you know, Companies Commission Malaysia, right, Jordan, Oman and RBI, all the four speakers who were kind of presenting the role of XBRL and how XBRL has helped them improve the overall supervisory role as a regulator, it was kind of very established. Some of the presenters also did have IRIS name in the presentations.
For example, the principal advisor at RBI, when he gave his presentation. He did kind of mention how RBI has overall helped in overall how, you know, improve the whole, you know, banking supervisory system in India. He was speaking also of like NPAs and stuff like that, and also, you know, early fraud detection and stuff like that.
He did kind of also take our name in that in the speaking slot, which he kind of presented. Which is very, very nice to hear, by the way. Similarly, the also, you know, from Oman, Jordan, you know, also Malaysia did kind of mention our name in the presentations and speak about us, which is kind of very, very encouraging to see.
Of course, there were presenters like for example, Taiwan Stock Exchange. There in Taiwan, we did not do the implementation, but they were kind of trying to kind of say how that implementation has gone in their country and where they are also kind of looking for, you know, more, more, you know, improvements in the way they've kind of implemented.
They also want to move to this new reporting requirement, which is like iXBRL. Most of the regulators have adopted XBRL, but the next generation of, or the improved avatar of XBRL is what is called as iXBRL. Countries like Taiwan are also kind of considering to adopt iXBRL at some point in time.
They were kind of explaining their own, you know, challenges in implementing and stuff like that. It was a very well attended event, and it was very nice to see that out of five speakers, you know, speakers were our customers on the regulatory division.
What this does is the following. One of the consequences of this event that happened here is that neighboring countries and other Asian countries were keeping an eye on it. Many of them actually participated virtually in the conference, it nudges them in the direction that we would like them to go. We actually expect at least one or two of these countries to start on their XBRL preparation going forward and very quickly.
I think that's the big purpose that events like this will actually, they actually serve. Secondly, when four out of five regulators come and talk about IRIS, I think that's a huge endorsement that also gives comfort to people. On the sidelines, at least two, three of the regulators have actually invited us to come to their countries and basically see what more we can actually do.
You know, there's a thing that we keep discussing internally now that we have hit 50 countries. By the way, we've hit 50 countries as of now, with Bhutan coming in. I used to say 48 plus, it's now 50. With 50 countries, work happening with either regulators or enterprises, we don't really need to add to any more countries, though I secretly, I still have the aspiration of, you know, covering as many countries as possible.
The fact that we have these countries, if we just deepen our presence in these countries, that's enough for us to grow, quite literally. That certainly is an extremely important element of our strategy going forward. These conferences where four out of five regulators stand up and say, "You know, we work with IRIS," becomes a huge endorsement and a source of comfort for each of them, creates a situation where they want to do more with us.
In every one of these countries, when they actually come here and they see the local regulator like RBI also working with us, they basically are very, very satisfied. That's the basic carry away as far as the XBRL Asia conference is concerned. One of the consequence of that is, some of you might be maybe aware that I talked about the CAG report, where CAG had talked about data standards. Many state governments in India have taken heed of the CAG report and have started talking about data standards themselves.
It won't be long before Indian states also move in the direction of data standards. On the chat box, I've posted a link of a document that's been put out by the Tamil Nadu government. If you look at the document, the Tamil Nadu government actually talks about XBRL being an optional adoption by various departments of the state government in Tamil Nadu, and it won't be long before it becomes mandatory.
You know, at the first step when something new happens, it's the recognition. In the second step, people start adopting it. I think you can safely say that all the 29 states in the country will be paying heed to these things, and will actually be taking it forward at their own pace. We're quite happy with the progress on this front. That's where we are.
I'm happy to shut up and take any questions that you have. We also have Diwakar here from my office who can show you... One of the big problems with XBRL filing in India is that nobody's using the data. Time permitting, we'll ask Diwakar to do a demo, and I would strongly urge you to start using it. It's free.
We will worry about start pricing it much later. In the meanwhile, if there are questions, happy to take them. Do download that link. The link is there in the chat box. Please click on it and download the link and take a look at it.
Yeah, Vikas, please unmute yourself and go ahead.
Hello, sir. Couple of questions. One is, could you please speak a little more if you have made any progress in terms of the GST invoice filing? The second question was about your filing, your, the press release that you made regarding Microsoft, your tie-up with Microsoft. Could you please speak a little bit more about these two? Thank you.
Basically, the Microsoft thing means that our product is available through Office 365. It's nothing more than that. It's not some major tie-up with Microsoft. Every software company wants their partnership, partner ecosystem to basically work with their own products to make it available.
The number of people globally using Microsoft products is huge, and I think it works to our advantage. It's no I would not read too much into it in terms of recognition and whatever. It's one of those hygiene factors. I'm presuming that you're referring to a disclosure management system and Office 365 integration. Anu, you wanna talk about it? Anuradha?
Yes. Yes, yes. I can speak about it. So far if you see, you know, overall, at least from the IRIS CARBON business line, what we've been kind of doing is we've been going after geographies and mandates where XBRL reporting is being introduced, you know. That has been our focus so far.
What we want to kind of do is while XBRL comes in the very last leg of the reporting, we want to kind of get into the working process of the compliance reporting team, you know, which is of course the preparation of annual reports. Going forward, ESG is also a very, very, you know, or like a hot topic which is kind of coming up. With this overall Office 365 integration with IRIS CARBON, we've got two opportunities here.
It is for the existing. We have a customer base already. We are in a nice position to go ahead and speak to the same CFO's office and have sell opportunity, which means we are going, it's like a backward integration, right? You're going to the reports and stuff like that. That is one opportunity with our existing customers.
The second thing is, of course, this also is going to help us go beyond an XBRL mandate. You know, because the XBRL mandate is not in our control. There are so many factors which comes in political, you know, and also the interest of the regulator and stuff like that. However, what we feel is there's a genuine need of, you know, compliance reporting SaaS solutions.
A lot of companies right now prepare the, you know, annual reports, quarterly reports, all sorts of reports in a very manual. With a SaaS offering, we think we'll be also able to, you know, go after companies where there's a need for a solution like this and it is not XBRL dependent. It's not mandate dependent. That's like another area where we think, you know, there is potential.
What I wanna add is this hygiene factor, because many companies prepare their annual reports, at least going over the final stage, using Microsoft Office or one of its components. It's imperative that we are on it to be able to ensure that we don't lose customers by not being on it.
I would urge you not to look at it as a tie-up with Microsoft. I shudder to use that word. As I said, as a company, we are very, very conservative in terms of the way we say things. We disclose these things in the market, not because we have a reason, but we need to disclose it. We need to disclose these things when they happen, and we will disclose it, and we will keep disclosing it.
As I said, it's not, it's not a tie-up in that sense. It's allowing the product to be available on Microsoft platforms. It's available today because many people who want to do backward integration, and there are adjacent products that we will keep launching, for which working with Microsoft becomes very important, and that's the way to look at it.
As far as GST is concerned, the big churn we think will happen once the e-invoice mandate is launched. We're still waiting for it to be launched. There have been some hiccups on the government side, but I think it's getting to be under control. Some churn has started happening. There are no precise numbers.
I think we'll get more clarity by the end of the year in terms of where we're headed. We're all waiting for the e-invoice mandate to kick in, and that's really going to be the next big driver of churning market. That we think will start happening around January first.
Thank you, sir. regarding the Microsoft, what... I don't know what the correct word is, maybe partnership, right? I think wouldn't it sort of Wouldn't it be... I know you are trying to say it's not such a big deal, but I would say it's a big feather in your cap because it signals something that a large company is willing to tie up, partner with us and offer our product in conjunction with Office 365. I thought it was something really big.
See, for example, Vikas asking the question, right? Vikas?
Yes, sir. That's me.
Vikas, if you wrote a letter and using Microsoft Word, are you using Microsoft Word to write a letter? Microsoft is not gonna be very proud or not so proud that you did the product that you wrote your letter in Microsoft Word. Similarly, if tomorrow, for example, Pushpa puts up a research report and using Microsoft Word, they're gonna be very proud of it.
The point I'm making, I'm not saying it cannot be a big deal. If we are not in Microsoft, we run the risk of losing some business. By being in Microsoft, we're able to defend our turf much, much better. It's also possible that we can grab new business because of that, I don't see that as being a huge, big driver.
I see this more as a hygiene factor than anything else at this point in time. I see this more as a necessity than anything else at this point in time. It's not a conscious strategy or to basically... It's not a partnership. There's no corporate agreement between us and Microsoft to be able to work on Office 365.
Going forward, if you're gonna be offering solutions on the cloud, you will necessarily be working with softwares also on the cloud. That's where things like this become very, very important. You will see many, many more products coming up from us and from other people on such cloud-based platforms. My only request to you is I... See, anybody can develop a product on Office 365.
I don't think Microsoft has any objections. Ultimately, as far as Microsoft is concerned, they'll be able to sell more licenses. More power to them. Let them do that. I'm just saying I'm not saying dismiss it, but I'm also saying don't read too much into it.
Sir, could I ask you a more like a product feature kind of a question? Would it help us, for example, if there's a user in, say, Bajaj Finance who wants to file an XBRL report, so he can now use Office 365 products and very quickly be able to create his reports. Is that the kind of XBRL reports, is that the kind of feature that will come into play here?
Vikas, I said. Anu?
Can you just come one more time, please?
Yeah. Anu, my question was, so this sort of partnership with Microsoft, sorry, Office 365.
Mm-hmm.
Does it allow them to sort of create the XBRL report in, say, Excel and then very quickly? The whole, between, say, IRIS CARBON and Excel, does it work more smoothly with this tie-up? Is there something, some feature like that or product level feature like that?
Okay. Let me kind of explain how this works, Anu. The overall XBRL, you know, of course, it's like an open source standard, right? Overall, IRIS CARBON, what we've kind of done is we've kind of gone ahead and used that standard and the whole activity of, you know, what we call as tagging, right?
The tagging, review, validation, all of those are modules inside IRIS CARBON that we have built. That all of that is, you know, IRIS's, you know, let's say, IP. Overall, if you see integration with Office 365, what it allows is, you know, for example, it is not that in an it'll allow a user to go and do the tagging, right? That is not something which exists right now.
The tagging is a module that we have brought in IRIS CARBON, and that is proprietary to IRIS. In the Excel file, what happens is usually when compliance teams prepare reports. You know, most accountants, finance have Excel as the base for, you know, for all the numbers, you know, and it's like a data repository for numbers for, you know, financial tables and stuff like that.
What happens is with this whole integration, the overall, you know, ease of kind of preparing reports becomes much better, right? Because otherwise just imagine if there's a 10-member team who's preparing or authoring reports. You know, I'll be working on my desktop, you'll be working on your desktop, and there's somebody who's kind of, you know, collaborating everything and gathering. All of that manual activity gets eliminated.
Everything is done online, you know, which means everybody's working on one centralized document. Of course, this, you know, serves as a centralized spreadsheet which is linked to the Word. That's another very important thing. XL tags are embedded on IRIS CARBON, which means whenever a number changes, it can very smoothly be done on the Excel file.
All the number updates will, you know, flow directly into the Word and finally to IRIS CARBON. Whenever there are number updates, the XBRL tagging also gets retained. The XBRL modules are not there on the Excel or the Word. You know, the XBRL modules are there in IRIS CARBON. Does that make sense?
Yeah. Yeah. Sure. Can I ask one more question?
If nobody else has a question, sure. Please, by all means.
Okay. Sure. Thank you, sir. Sir, my question is more of a very long-term kind of a thing. Say five years or 10 years from now, are you... What is your... What is the game plan in your minds? Are you gonna bring in, say, professional management or something like that after the founders take a backseat. What is the game plan there? If you could just... You know, you can, you can just give me a high-level thought process. I'm not looking for specific answers here.
Are you saying the founders currently are on the picture?
No, no. I meant if you're gonna hire a CEO to run, not now, say 10 years from now, if you're gonna hire, do you have plans of hiring a CEO where the promoters take a more board level kind of a seat? Is that the thought process? What is the thing here is my question.
Anu, when I called you to ask you to be on the call, we've already told you. When I called Anu to be asking to be on the call, I said that there are investors who would like me to step down and for people, others to take over. Anu said people want me to step down for others to take over.
That started. I mean, that's why I wanted you on the call. Ultimately, everybody has an expiry date. I have an expiry date. Every founder in the company has an expiry date. I'm 60. Deep is a few years younger. Balu is a year younger. We all have expiry dates. I think what we need to do is to put in place we should have a company that people should want to join.
See if a company, for example, many of you who've been shareholders for a while know that I've not taken a salary for a long time. I've started taking a salary. The company is getting stronger. Today, the company is financially much stronger than it ever was before. To be able to attract good people, you need to have a much, much stronger company. I'm not saying that if it's all solid, you know, well settled, only then people will come.
People will join a train that's accelerating and going faster. I think the challenge for us is to show people that these things are possible. We are putting in place the runway for take-off. Hopefully, we will take off and not crash. I think we've had enough crashes. We've had enough.
We have so much bad karma over the last so many years. It's time for some good karma to take over. So we're hoping for that. Obviously that. I mean, I think, I don't think any of us expect to be here forever. We are first-generation entrepreneurs, Deep, Balu and I, and we all are extremely mindful of the fact that we have an expiry date.
Therefore, it's important for us to get the right team in place. Which is also why we keep inviting colleagues of ours to come and participate in these calls so that they can get the exposure that's needed. Vineet is an outstanding colleague. Anu is an outstanding colleague. Diwakar is more recent, so I will not use any hyperbole about him.
I will not use anything to describe what he does, otherwise he'll ask for a higher increment next year. We are mindful of this, and we are putting in place the systems for that to happen. You said 10 years. I don't think I'll last in this company 10 years.
As of now, I'm giving myself 5 years in this company, after which somebody needs to take over. Who will it be? At this point in time, I have no clue. It's a question that we keep asking ourselves. We have a solid level of next level of management. We have people like Anu who are extremely good, and we have several others who are extremely good.
Our ideal situation will be to find somebody from within. If nobody from within is able to step up, we need to look for somebody from outside. It's a complicated business. Just hiring somebody who has the domain knowledge is not gonna happen. It's not that simple. We need to find somebody. That's what we're gonna do.
All right, sir. Thank you very much.
Thank you, Vikas.
Anyone wishes to ask a question, please unmute yourself and go ahead. Karl, please go ahead.
Yeah, hi, sir. One of the things which I wanted to know, and this I guess pertains more to the Create segment, is that what are the key factors that make a prospective client select a particular SaaS platform? Who exactly is the main influencer? I mean, when you're marketing your product, do you have to convince the compliance officer? Is it the CEO of the company? Is it that a regulator such as the RBI or the SEC gives a diktat to all the regulating entities that these are some of the platforms that are acceptable for the entity to report?
Karl, it's a fantastic question. It's a question that we keep grappling with all the time. It's not one approach that moves the mandate. Karl, if you don't go on mute, I think there's a lot of feedback coming from you. It's not one approach that will help.
It's not one shoe that fits all sizes. Now, the nature of the compliance market is such that you need to be able to be seen by the person who's gonna use your product. Very often calling on them makes a huge difference. Anu has traveled extensively across Europe, meeting a cross-section of companies and persuading them to come and take our product.
Now, if you're selling a product worth about, say, anything from, say, $5,000 to $10,000, making a trip to Europe to get even one or two customers is actually worthwhile because of the Indian cost structure, because these are SaaS offerings and the customer stays with you for a long, long time. That's one part. Second, the reason why a certain company comes to you is because other companies in the same country have come to you.
You know, I can never overstate my gratitude to a Belgian company called Colruyt, which was the first to sign up with us. The moment Colruyt signed up with us, many, many, many companies in Europe started signing up with us. The endorsement that we got from Colruyt was absolutely deafening. I think Anu can talk about it.
There are several such marquee customers that I can talk about in every country that we actually operate in. We spend a lot of time trying to identify these marquee companies, going and meeting them and telling them how good we are. The third thing that's very important, the fact that we are visible on the internet.
Ultimately in the world of compliance, like in the world of medicine, you don't pick a doctor on the basis of just L1. You don't just do it on the basis of pricing. You need to have comfort in the doctor's ability to deliver. In the case of compliance, you have comfort in the capability of the company you're gonna work with to deliver on your compliance solutions.
The fact that we work with regulators in so many countries, the fact that we work with RBI, the fact that we work with Singapore, I think all of us in India need to be proud that we have a great regulator in RBI. We don't realize the amount of respect that RBI commands globally. When you say you work with RBI and the banking system actually works with you, I think it's a tremendous source of comfort for many, many people across the world.
Price also makes a difference, but we are not the lowest cost. There are people significantly lower in terms of cost. To answer the question that you asked about working with regulators, yes, working with the regulator like we do in South Africa and India and a few other countries makes a difference. But you can't tom-tom it.
You can't basically say, "I'm the teacher's son, therefore, I have the question paper." It doesn't work like that. I think we need to be very careful, especially in countries where we work with regulators, not to use that to gain customers. It's a completely different process. I will not say that we have not gained customers because people have seen that also. To what extent that happens, I don't think it's very, very significant. Anu, you wanna share with us, how you pitch when you go and call on customers in Europe, for example, or US?
Yeah.
One last thing. Sorry, one last thing.
Yeah.
I think our partner network, we are extremely grateful to. I mean, our partner network has stood by us through thick and thin. You know, many people keep telling us, "Why don't you just use the partners to acquire a customer for a year and then get out?" We don't do that.
We want to work with partners. We want to work with partners in the short term and the long term. I think the partners have delivered absolutely, you know, good customers to us. It's also a question of choosing the right kind of past partners that we need. Anu, why don't you just share with us the approach that you have taken when you go into Europe and U.S.
Okay. This whole European mandate was supposed to start 2020. I think Europe was one of the... Started off much earlier, like, you know, 2019 and stuff like that. I think it all comes through, like, a lot of things. You know, of course we need to have good product sales, marketing, all of that, all of that matters a lot.
I think in Europe, what really helped us get the initial customers was our overall experience and the thought leadership that we, that we show in this space. For example, we write a lot of, you know, materials on latest topics. For example, you know, the ESEF mandate. You know, we got a first inquiry through our website, by the way.
You know, a company called Colruyt, which is the number one retail company in Belgium. They had kind of reached out to us, and, of course, they had an IT division in India. The CFO's office from Belgium came. That's how we went and met with them, presented our solution, and this was like, I think, almost in, like, 2018.
As early as 2018, actually. You know, there were a series of presentations, and they kind of really liked the offering and they signed up with us. Even before, it was two years for the mandate to kickstart off, they wanted to do a voluntary, you know, iXBRL, you know, like a dry run, like.
They were one of the very early companies in the whole of Europe to adopt iXBRL. We requested things like testimonials and stuff like that because they were kind of very, very happy. They did kind of, you know, give us a very good testimonial overall around the entire offering. With that one testimonial, and of course, that is where, you know, I to kind of connect with Deloitte.
One of the Deloitte Belgium people were at Colruyt, and they were, like, one of the consultants for Colruyt. Through that Colruyt, you know, engagement, we got Deloitte Belgium, and through Deloitte Belgium, we... They wouldn't kind of sign up with anybody, them being like a Big Four. They kind of started recommending...
There were kind of events that they kind of started hosting. That's how we got invited. you know, this was again, like, 2019, 2020. We got invited to participate in a lot of events. Because of Colruyt, we got a lot of Belgium area. Similarly, if you see, other examples, we also got our early partners also, by the way, from Belgium itself.
That gave us a very good momentum to kickstart off even started. Similarly, if you see, Italy is also another geography where we work with Deloitte. Deloitte uses our product since 2014 for the Italian XBRL mandate. Similarly, we get our sales, you know, forming a sales team. This was, I think, in 2019 for the Europe region, because we did see an opportunity coming up.
Another interesting customer that we kind of signed up was a company called Eni, which is actually Italy's one of the largest, you know, energy companies. You know, they are into the petroleum industry. For them also, they were already working with a company, another vendor for the U.S. SEC reporting.
This European reporting was new for them. Of course, I'm not a salesperson, to be very honest. I come with a XBRL background. I know Carbon. I think our conversations were most more like consultative, you know, I would say selling, let's put it that way.
I think they like the whole approach of that we know our stuff and they decided, "Okay, fine, we'll sign up with you for the ESEF reporting." Two years ago, and this is, this is going to be our third year with them. This year they've also decided to sign up with us for the U.S. SEC reporting.
They were working with one of the very large players, you know, other vendors for the U.S. SEC reporting and seeing the overall, you know, way how the product is and the overall experience that they have. They've also signed up for the U.S. SEC reporting as well this year. Similarly, we signed up some very good partners. For example, Slovenia is a small country, but, we signed up with a partner called ADD.
Through the partner, we managed to get close to 90% of the market share in that particular country. You know, being in India, our competition, some of them share the names. There's a company called ParsePort, you know. They had a very large team, a sales team. In each country they had a salesperson. If you see minimum, they would have 25 people. If you see from our side, we had only 3 or 4, you know, salespeople here, and that too from India. It was much later that we had one colleague in Spain.
With a 3-4 member sales team here, I think we've managed to kind of, you know, get 250-280 customers as of today, which I think is a good job that we've kind of done. Similarly, in the U.S., if you see, U.S. also has been a very different market for.
Anu, one sec.
Yes.
One thing I want to add before anything else is we are also grateful to the Indian embassies overseas. In many countries, we work with the Indian missions to try to do some local outreach. You know, the government gets a very bad name very often. I think if we can actually talk to the missions overseas and try and come with a value proposition, they actually help us.
Many companies in Europe which went through the COVID adverse COVID situation, we offered them a free filing for one year, and most of them converted to paying clients in subsequent years. I think I will also not underestimate the value that accrued to us on account of Indian missions. I think I'll go to the next question because you got two hands going up. Rahul, your hand went up first.
Yeah. Thank you, sir. I wanted to ask about the phase 2 of the FERC. I believe that in phase 1 we had partnered with someone, and then I think that partnership had stopped post phase 1. Do we plan to go by ourselves for phase 2, or have we partnered with somebody else?
As of now, we're going on our own. If we find a suitable partner, we are open to it. Our partner in phase one has launched their own product as well. I think, you know, there's something that I wanna share with you. It's something I keep saying to my colleagues internally. One big lesson for us.
Now, this doesn't necessarily change our behavior towards our partners. One big lesson for us is that choosing your partners is very, very important. Choosing your partners carefully is very important. Partners also have aspirations in terms of their own growth. We have to be mindful of that. Very often the.
When people talk about who your competitors are, I think who your partners are is also an extremely important question that we keep asking ourselves. We are mindful of the aspirations of our partners in every market. In phase two, will we go on our own? As of now, yes. If we find a suitable partner, will we go with them? The answer is yes. Are we looking for one? We keep our eyes and ears open because our entire growth strategy in every market so far has been on the back of our strong partners.
Got it. Got it. Thank you. Sir, how big would this opportunity be for us in terms of, or how much would be the average realization for these kind of deals and what kind of share are we looking to get for the FERC phase 2?
The per unit realization in phase 2 will be much less than phase 1 because they are smaller companies and therefore the per unit realization will be much less. I think our realization will depend on whether we work with a partner or not work with a partner. We also have to see the complexity of the taxonomy that comes out in terms of the complexity of the filing that needs to be done. I think it's still too early to figure out our price point for that activity. The moment we have clarity, we'll share that with you.
Okay. Okay.
Okay.
Yeah. Okay. Sure, sure. All right.
No, go ahead, Rahul. Afterwards, Saket will come.
Yeah. Okay, sir. One question I had was on the recurring sales. We are right now at around INR 50 crore of recurring revenues. What kind of cost do we actually incur for the recurring part of the sales? I just wanted to understand what kind of profit can we get just from that part of our sales?
Again, it's a fantastic question. See, the cost of retaining a customer has two parts to it. One is the cash cost in terms of engagement. That's more a time cost in terms of people engaging with them and so on and so forth. There is no additional cost except product upgradations which needs to be done anyway.
Very often in any company, often people get transferred, new people need to be trained. That's a cost that needs to be incurred. I think generally speaking, the more and more the customer is able to do things on his own. In year 1, in most mandates, a lot of hand-holding happens. A lot of wheel just need to be given to customers.
The more the customer can handle things on their own, as is beginning to happen in many, many markets, the greater the margins that accrue to you. I think it varies from customer to customer. I think we are completely mindful of that, so we have internal systems that keeps track of P&L for each customer. Each customer, the numbers are very different.
Okay. Because sir, for some of the companies in the SaaS space, so their recurring revenues may they earn as much as, you know, 60, 70, 75% gross margin also. Are we looking at that kind of a percentage? I mean, if you can just give some like some figure it would be quite helpful.
Sure.
Uh.
Please note that one of the problems in IRIS today is that we have a complicated business with three different divisions, and therefore the play of one division eats into the margins of another division, quite literally.
Sure.
When you aggregate over the company, you actually get some meaningless numbers. If you go product by product in terms of pure SaaS offerings, the numbers will not be very different from the kind of numbers that you just talked about. It's really also a function of at what stage of usage the customer is. In year one of the customer's usage of the product will be a lot more, what should we call it, health component, service component. Year two, it'll come down. Year three, we want to eliminate it completely. It's really over time, the margins keep improving as the customer takes the product in-house.
Got it. Thank you so much. Yeah.
Saket, the floor is yours.
Yeah. Namaskar, sir, and thank you for the opportunity. Sir, firstly in terms of, we doing business with the Reserve Bank, what kind of revenue have we posted for the last year, and what are the terms of the contract, with the XBRL filing, sir?
Vineet, you wanna take the question?
You're asking about the revenue? Hi, Saket, this is Vineet.
Yes.
Are you asking only the revenue from the RBI?
Yes, only RBI. Only RBI.
We do with RBI, I think so I have knowledge about the XBRL. Any other aspect of it.
Over the last two years from that XBRL project which we are implementing, we would have recognized around INR 10 crore over the last two years.
What are the terms of the contract? I mean, for how many years have we signed it? Every year what kind of revenue-.
RBI has been with us from 2008 onwards, and they're not going anywhere. These are all long-term contracts. We shouldn't recognize 1 thing. When you work with a regulator, if you make a mistake, the regulator will throw you out. Even if you have a 20-year contract with a regulator, the regulator always has the finger on the button to the exit gate to throw you out at any point in time.
It's up to you to ensure that we don't make any mistakes and so on and so forth. Every regulator we work with, whether it be Singapore or RBI or any other market, they've been with us from day 1. There are markets like Thailand, where we did not stay on any beyond a certain time because our local partner took over and is running with it.
There are situations like that. Regulators like Singapore's ACRA, RBI in India, and several others have stayed with us since the beginning and will continue to stay with us unless we screw up, which we hope we never do.
Sir.
They keep getting renewed.
Yes, sir?
They keep getting renewed every time, every so often.
Okay, sir. Just to take into account the pie of business that we can garner specifically from the regulator like RBI, what is the scope of work or the size of the pie going ahead in terms of only pertaining to XBRL or the further initiatives also, which I think so Reserve Bank currently is working, I think so with Ind AS also with NBFC migration.
Which they have been sending emails all across getting details from the NBFCs in terms of whether the same are filing submitting their accounts in Ind AS format or not. Are we working with RBI in with that project also? I just wanted to understand what is the total business opportunity from RBI in particular.
one of the-
On an annual basis, yeah.
One of the challenges companies like us have is the challenge to say no to any business that actually comes to us. We define our business quite narrowly. We basically say that we are in the business of providing regulatory filing solutions. That's what we do. We are not a software services company. We don't do bespoke software projects.
Now, unfortunately, in any regulatory implementation, some amount of system integration is inevitable, and that to that extent, therefore, we end up doing a software project. While RBI is a huge opportunity from an IT industry point of view, we have focused completely and narrowly on the regulatory compliance solution for RBI, which is where our eyes are. Do we see any significant growth in that going forward? The answer is no. We will continue to maintain it. Therefore, the routine reviews will keep coming.
Even this current phase where there's a huge, you know, they've overhauled their hardware and all that stuff, we're actually working with TCS, who actually have the lion's share of the contract to make this happen. Are we interested in doing other things with RBI? As a matter of policy, we don't want to stray outside our area of core competence.
When it comes to software, bespoke software development, there are many great companies in the country who are able to do these things. We are not in that space at all. We don't run a bench. We don't have people who will be able to work across technologies. We are a RegTech. We're a regulatory software provider, and that's where we will continue to stay focused on. We will not do anything else.
Thanks, sir. In terms of that, are we looking for any work from CPC or the Income Tax Department in terms of they coming out with simpler forms for ITRs, synchronizing of datas, all those stuffs which are in the annual? Are we working with any of them going ahead in terms of again, that is going to be simpler form of filings only going ahead?
If a regulator wants to move into an XBRL-based filing system, you will find us first in line waiting to do the work. If a regulator simply wants a data collection platform, you may not see us there with any great degree of enthusiasm unless we see, basically, we have done it like this. If there's a demand for an IRIS iFile product, if there's a deployment possibility for an IRIS iFile product, we will be there. If it's a bespoke software development project, we will not be there. We are very, very clear about that.
A small suggestion, sir. In terms of this filing aspect for XBRL for the RBI part, there is an aspect of a lot of NBFCs they are facing is about the filing of nil returns. If we could implement some executable files wherein the nil returns can be filed at ease, that would suffice a lot of hassle of filing again and again for every quarter. There is one of these foreign, I think so forms, Form 13, if I'm not wrong, wherein we, many people having exposure to foreign exchange are to file and other NBFCs are to file a nil return again in the XBRL format.
If an executable file could be created so that we can do a declaration for the entire year or for the period gone by, that would suffice a lot of hassles that we have to do for every quarter. If you could suggest some ways by which that filing part can be looked into, sir. That's a quarterly basis, wherein 90% of the small, medium-sized NBFCs are affected. If you could look into the aspect, that's a request from my side, sir.
Sure. Thank you. Valuable suggestion. I'll pass it on to my colleagues who deal with RBI and the products that go into serving the RBI ecosystem. Thank you for your valuable suggestion.
Thank you, sir. I'll join the queue.
Thank you. Anyone wishes to ask a question, please use the raise hand option.
In the 10 minutes that remains, I will get my colleague, Diwakar, to share his screen and show each of you how you can actually consume XBRL data. Diwakar, go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, everyone. I'll just share my screen now. Please let me know once it's visible.
It does make it visible, then we will say it's visible.
Yeah, just now I've done.
Thank you very much.
Okay. First I'll take you to the web-based browser tool. This is.
One sec. Just the background is the following. Today, 5,000 companies are submitting data to BSE, NSE and XBRL. 32,000 companies are filing with ROC and XBRL, the data is not being consumed because nobody knows how to use the data. We have created a very simple tool by just dragging and dropping the annual report of a company to this tool. That XBRL file will automatically get converted into an Excel file. That's what Diwakar is gonna show you with this tool at this point in time. Diwakar, go on.
Yeah. I've just logged in. We'll pick a company from NSE. Since there are many people, I'll.
One sec. Wait. Karl, Let's give Karl the privilege of picking a company.
Yeah.
Karl, can you Karl pick, just pick a company, please. Karl?
Any name. NTPC. National Thermal Power Corp.
Karl picked NTPC. Let's pick NTPC.
Okay. Sure. We'll download.
What Diwakar is gonna do is to download the NTPC file and drop it into this application. That's all.
I'll just save as file. Let me just open this folder again.
This URL is xbrl.iriscarbon.com. For any company filing XBRL, please feel free to go and use this to create an Excel file from the XBRL file. It come with XBRL tags. If you want to consume it into your proprietary model, you can do that automatically. What are you doing here, Diwakar?
No, it's just opening now. Yeah.
There is the Excel file. The Excel file generated from the XBRL filing of NTPC is now available for you. The tags used are the XBRL tags. With a one-time mapping, you can have the labels correspond to the label that you are used to. It's that simple. This tool can be used by you for any XBRL file or any iXBRL file of any country, anywhere in the world.
If you want to compare an Indian company with some other company, well, you can't compare using this because the taxonomies are different. For that, there's a different tool we will show you. If you just want to download the XBRL file of any company anywhere in the world, you can use this tool. Diwakar, just type out the URL in the chat box.
Yeah.
Please open the chat box and type out the URL. You now have the URL, so please use this to download into Excel the XBRL file of any company anywhere in the world. It's that simple to do. Of course, it's taken a lot of investment from our side to make it happen, and it's a tool that we're offering across the country to everybody who wants to use it. The second thing that Diwakar will show you is an Excel-based tool in Office 365, which allows you to compare companies. Diwakar, over to you. Show the comparison, please.
Yeah. Sure. We have various, as you can say, capital market mandates over here. I'll just pick the BSE. We'll just have to go here. You can type any company. I'll just pick Tata Motors.
Diwakar, why don't you compare... I know what all database, what all companies you have in the database, but since he mentioned NTPC, can you compare NTPC with, say, CESC?
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Do NTPC, no? If somebody's given you a name, use that name.
Sure, sure, sir.
If you don't have it, then it's a different thing altogether. Tell him it's not there. It's okay to get embarrassed.
No, no, it is there. I'll just show this up. You can compare this with any company of your choice.
CESC. I want to compare with CESC, Calcutta Electric Supply Corporation. C-E-S-C.
Okay. I think it's not here.
Say Calcutta Electric Supply, please.
Tata Power as well.
Okay, Tata Power.
Okay, sure.
Tata Power. Pick Tata Power.
I think we'll take Tata Motors, if it's okay.
No, Tata Power.
it's not in our repository as of now.
Please name, please.
Yeah, it's not there as of now.
Thank you.
I'll just take Tata Motors now. One second. We just need this ISIN code from here. If you just put their ISIN, you can compare different companies as well, and you can compare across various verticals as well.
Again, Diwakar, so the way this actually works is you have to download a little app from the Office Store.
Yeah.
-which will get installed in your Excel sheet as an add-in. Once you have the add-in, you can compare any company with any company that you want to. I would recommend that you first check if the taxonomies are harmonized, normalized for it to make a meaningful comparison. Otherwise, the data will not flow. What we are now doing is to normalize it and harmonize it across the world, which is not an easy task, That's what we're working on right now. The first tool, please use it. Please start using it to download data. Diwakar, thank you very much.
Thank you.
Just post on the chat box a little instruction on how people can get this data so that people actually can start using it.
Sure.
If there are no other questions, we will close for the day. We've got four minutes left to go. Yeah, Harish, go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, S. Swaminathan. I just had a couple of questions more on the business side. You know, what's sort of the pipeline looking especially in the U.S., and if you can also talk about the competitive landscape over there, given all the turmoil we heard about in the U.S. economy. That's really trying to just understand.
There'll be no material change from when we met last time after the half-year results as far as our outlook is concerned, except for the fact that we won the Bhutan mandate.
Mm-hmm.
As far as U.S. thing is concerned, compliance is something that nobody can actually escape. Therefore, therefore there's gonna be no significant or even insignificant changes in timelines of implementation or rollouts of mandates that are already in the pipeline. I don't know to what extent the FERC mandate is getting delayed because of COVID in America.
I don't think it is. I think it's more preparedness of the companies as opposed to anything else. Though I will verify it. There's nothing significant to report as far as changes in the outlook is concerned between the time we met in the half year and now, except as I mentioned to you, for the Bhutan mandate, which we actually won about a week ago.
I see. In terms of the competitive intensity, you know, how are the other companies which are, which we have talked about in the past, because of the, you know, either balance sheet issues or the sort of funding drying up, especially for the private competitors. Any color on that side?
Globally, for example, when you take a look at it, Workiva is going from strength to strength and doing extremely well. If you see their numbers, they're a towering head and they are the company to beat at the end of the day. They're a company to benchmark against. I mean, we are tiny compared to them. Workiva is really the market leader, and they don't have any funding issues of any kind.
They have a war chest with which they can decimate everybody. They actually took over ParsePort, which is a company in Europe, and they've added a significant amount of cloud to it. That's, in a way, it's been good for us because by taking over ParsePort, they've actually ratcheted up the price to be able to do or to get to increase their revenues.
The pricing pressure they brought on is of a different kind altogether. In India, for example, the GST thing, we expect some traction to happen after the e-invoice mandate goes live. We see a churn happening. We see at least one or two of our competitors in the space who are currently paying the price for not being able to differentiate between the balance sheet and the P&L.
As I said, globally, I think right now it's more a standstill situation. We see some things happening in the new year. As you know, the ESG mandate is kicking in from not next year, the year after. Some of the preparation is going into the ESG mandate. We've already got some customers like Gap using our tool for their filings. We see some traction on that front.
As of now, the big driver we see for us is actually gonna be from new regulatory implementations of XBRL platforms, where we hope that we will have something good happening for us, at least in the four or five proposals that we have put out. One, as I told you, has come out. Bhutan has come out in our favor. The others, I hope it comes out in our favor. Some will, some won't. You win some, you lose some. That's where the growth driver will be going forward more than the enterprise side at this point in time.
Got it. Just lastly, I'm not asking for a guidance per se, but you know, what kind of growth do you anticipate for the next three-year timeframe?
The easy answer is I don't know. The difficult answer is it really is a function of how much cash we have to mount an assault on the markets that we are talking about. We also have backup plans in terms of trying to attack those markets without a war chest. We know how to live frugally. I think the word used is cockroach.
We survive. Cockroaches know how to survive. I think, I never thought the day would come and I would say I'm proud to be a cockroach, but that's where we are. If we had a lot of money, I think we would approach it differently. If we don't have a lot of money, we'd approach it very differently. We are, to some extent, a prisoner of the schedules of the regulator.
We hope some of them look at things very seriously. We also believe that the G20 presidency is an opportunity for us, so we are trying to figure out a way to showcase ourselves in front of the world, leveraging G20 to tell the world that we can offer them solutions. Because the fact is, out of the 200 odd countries in the world, only 70 have now implemented XBRL.
The rest will actually follow suit at a suitable time. We actually hope that because of G20 we will raise our visibility. Also, the last two years has compelled many regulators to accelerate their plans to move to a new age regulatory filing platform. We are quite optimistic that that will give us the growth rhythm that we require going forward. I know I've not given you a number.
I know, I know I've not given you a specific answer to the question, but that's the best I can do at this point in time.
No, no, that's fine. Thank you so much and all the best.
Thank you, Rajesh. Saket, do you have a question again?
Sir, as you mentioned about the availability of fund that will define what the growth trajectory would be. As earlier articulated by you, that you are looking out for a rights issue. What is the update on the same and anything that we are missing in that you would like to share?
When we started working on the rights issue, I made it very, very clear that as promoters we have no money to subscribe to it. People said you can still go ahead with it. Then the market tanked, the price went down. Then the same people who said, "Oh, it's okay," now are saying that if the promoters don't subscribe it'll send a very bad signal, therefore you should not do a rights issue.
Our hands are tied. I think we will do what's appropriate. To get back to your last question that Rajesh asked, if we don't raise any funding, we will continue to grow at our 10% to 15% to 20% growth rate. If we raise funds, we'll do much better. If we throw up more cash, we'll do much better. Those are all factors that will actually weigh into the whole equation. As of now, the rights issue is on a standstill situation. Nothing much is happening at this point in time. Tushar, do you have a question?
Yeah, I'm actually surprised with your answer. Raising money in this market is not very difficult. If not rights, you're open to preferential allotment, right?
We are, but not at the current price, the way the markets, the way the market is.
Price is given in the market. If you want capital, you should just raise it. You should not worry about the price.
I hear you loud and clear, Tushar.
How much are you planning to raise?
We were looking within INR 30-50 crores.
You do it in two, three tranches, no? You don't have to do in 1 tranche.
That's a great suggestion. We've also explored that. I think, as I said, right now it's at a standstill. We will come back with reasonable answers going forward. Let me also add one more question, Tushar, which I think is very important here. You know, we are first generation entrepreneurs. We don't trade in the markets, but perceptions get for framed in the markets very, very easily.
Today, with 37% holding by promoters, we get pilloried by people at large in terms of the low promoter holding. If it goes below a certain level, it gets to be a very bad signal to the market, is what we are advised from time to time. I don't have a trading account. My colleagues don't trade in the market. We don't go and buy when the price goes down. We don't sell when the price goes up.
As I said, these are... we are prisoners of market sentiments in these ways, in this manner. You know, I come from a point of view that when you need to raise money, when money is available, you should raise money. When all these factors are taken into account, the board also comes into play and basically says, "Do you want to do it now? Do you want to do it later?"
You know, the only perfect science is hindsight. We've not done it, is the current, is the answer as of now. What will we do going forward? We will take your inputs as well. We will be guided by what the board says as well, and we will hopefully do what's appropriate.
No, what kind of valuation are you looking at? What valuation are you comfortable to raise the money at?
Oh, you know, a promoter deserve to be greedy, no?
No, no. Why? Because that's important. You said you are not happy with the current price. What price are you happy with?
No, no. It's not the question of happy with the current price. Even 37% is held by the promoters. SEBI has.
That is irrelevant because it's a professionally managed company. I mean, if somebody tells you that your stake is low, they're idiots. I'm sorry for using that word, but they don't know what is to build a company as a first generation entrepreneur and to build it honestly without siphoning off money from the company.
Tushar, the problem actually happens on account of the 25% ceiling that SEBI, the threshold that SEBI has in terms of promoter holding and the implications that come from going below 25. I'm not an expert on secretarial matters, so we turn to our lawyers and company secretaries to advise us on this matter. They keep telling us that whatever you do, you should not go below 25 because.
Why? What happens if you go below 25?
In my view, nothing. That's what the legal advice and the secretary-
No, no. There is nothing happens.
Okay.
Infosys was run with 5% equity by the founders. Nothing happens.
But they-
You are not getting right advice.
Okay. The point is, Infosys was in a steady state, where they had actually reached a steady state, where they didn't have to do subsequent fundraisers. I think your point is very-
No, Infosys also did lot of fundraisers.
Sure.
Promoters always had a low stake in Infosys. I don't know who's advising you. I mean, if you run a company, honestly, you are never going to have money.
Okay.
Unless you have some three, five other businesses where you generate cash.
We have none.
You siphon off money from here and then you put it back because-
We have no other business.
Tushar, you are not even taking your salary.
Yeah. I am now. Tushar, I'm now taking a salary recently.
Yeah, now you're taking. How are you going to get money to put in? You know.
We don't have. I think your point is well taken. Let me take it to the board as well. Right now, the answer is where we are. What are we gonna do tomorrow? I don't have an answer at the present time.
I think you should not stop growth of company for lack of capital. I think that will do more harm to the business than good, you know.
Understood. I hear you loud and clear.
Get a good advisor on board.
Sure.
is what I would say because from what you are saying, the opportunity seems to be huge. You are still very small, and you can be uncharted, you know, with somebody with more muscle power. For want of capital, you should not worry about, you know, not raising the capital. I think it will harm the business.
No, no.
What you have built so painstakingly over the years, growth is the only way to maintain the business.
I agree. I agree totally. Vineet, I hope you heard and convey this to Balu as well.
Yeah. We'll take the last question from Saket, and we'll close it. Saket, please go ahead.
We're already over time.
Sir. Yes, sir. Very brief point on you are looking for a INR 30 crore infusion into the company. What would that translate into? What kind of opportunity can that money bring onto to IRIS? Just wanted to have that understanding of what multiplier effect it will create.
Depends on how we use it and depends on where we actually use it. There are currently new mandates coming up in America. The bulk of the money that we actually raise, when I say bulk, almost all the money that we raise will actually be used to grow our business in America and Europe, where we've not done too badly so far.
The big mandate in America is in the state governments level, in the government level, where there are 90,000 filers who are expected to file their returns on a monthly basis. We expect it to be a $10,000 per pop and per unit kind of a revenue possibility. We have no basis to come up with a number as to what market share we actually get. There's no number to go by.
The money will actually be used to chase that opportunity in America if we have the money. Along with some similar opportunities in Europe, where there are ESG filings that are coming up. About 50,000 companies in Europe need to file, make their ESG submissions. We expect the price per filing will be about EUR 1,000 odd. These are the two broad mandates that we will actually chase and hopefully come up with a reasonable benchmark in terms of what market share we can get. That's where we will actually like to go.
One very-
That's the inclination of points.
One very small point again, sir. You spoke that when you spoke to your investors earlier about the rights issue, what was the feedback? I missed your point. You were explaining that first you went to your investors. I think so we have only 3,000 or 4,000 shareholders, a very small shareholder base.
When I look at the pedigree of the shareholders holding more than 1%, particularly Mr. Madhusudan Kela, who is an ace investor and also, I consider that he may be having deep pockets holding 6% equity, 5.5% equity in the company. The, I just wanted to understand what is the feedback from your investors when you have investors in pedigree like Mr. Koushik Sekhar and Mr.
Madhusudan Kela's family investing around 5%, 6% of the equity subscribing to it. Where is the question of paucity of funds coming? Have you explained your projections or plan to them? I think so these are the guys who can definitely help you with raising of funds and other activities. If your growth plans have that frugality or have that understanding of what you are eyeing, you can get over a period of time. What's the thought there, sir?
Saketji, I don't do selective disclosures. I don't pick up the phone and make selective disclosures.
No, no.
No, one second. I don't make selective disclosure investors. Secondly, you talk about Madhu and Koushik Sekhar and all. I want you to know that we have on this call Suhas Sarda, who's a legendary investor from India. He's one of the most experienced mutual fund investors for a long, long time.
I've known him from the day he entered the markets. We are fortunate to have people like this, and I'm very grateful to him for his counsel. We will take it back to our board and to our management and decide what to do, what's appropriate. I know I've already gone over time. It's already 10 minutes over time.
It's okay, sir. Thank you, sir. I was not about selective.
Saketji, this conversation can go on forever.
Yes, sir. Yeah, yeah.
I think we need to call it a day at this point in time.
That's all from my side. Thank you, sir.
We'll call it day at this point in time. Thank you all for joining this call. I hope that we can keep reposing the faith that you have in us and do good things for our shareholders. Of which I'm also one. Thank you very much again. Bye-bye.
Thank you for joining us today.