Even Zainat Man, good day and welcome to the Emcure Pharmaceuticals Limited Q4 FY 2025 earnings conference call. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star then zero on your touch-tone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Piyush Nahar, EVP, Corporate Strategy and Development from Emcure Pharmaceuticals Limited. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Thank you, Operator. Good afternoon, everyone. Earlier today, we released our financials for the fourth quarter of fiscal 2025, along with our press release. These are also posted on our website. We hope all of you had a chance to review it. I'd like to bring to everyone's notice that this call is being recorded, and the recording and transcript will be available on our website. To discuss the company's performance and outlook, we have on the call our Group CEO, Mr. Satish Mehta, our CFO, Tajuddin Shaikh, our Executive Director, Namita Thapar, Executive Director, Samit Mehta, and President, Corporate Development Strategy and Finance, Vikas Thapar. Before we begin, I want to remind everyone about the safe harbor related to today's investor call.
Today's discussion may include certain forward-looking statements, which must be viewed in conjunction with the risk that our business faces that could cause our future results, performance, or achievement to differ significantly from what is expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. At the end of the call, if you have any queries remaining unanswered, please feel free to contact us. I will now request Mr. Satish Mehta to provide the opening remarks. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Thank you, Piyush. This is Satish Mehta, Group CEO. Good afternoon to all of you. It's a pleasure and honor to speak to you while I'm speaking on the annual results for the year FY 2025. You have seen the results: INR 4,225 crore revenues, viewed 19.5%, led by 25% growth in domestic business and 16% in the international business. Ended in FY 2025 with a top-line growth of 18.5% and margins of 18.6%, and this is very much in line with the guidance we have given earlier. I must say that FY 2025 has been a transformation year with multiple milestones about which I'll speak as we go along. We got listed on stock exchange with extremely strong response from the investor community, which means a lot to all of us. In domestic market, we successfully integrated the Sanofi cardio business into our portfolio.
We sharpened our focus on the derma segment with the launch of our subsidiary, Enqutex. We expanded our women's health portfolio. We entered into the OTC segment with a product range under the Earth and Gala brand. In international markets, we successfully expanded our presence in Canada with the integration of the Mantra subsidiary. Brief on key highlights of the quarter and year. Let me focus on the domestic market. In Q4, we had a strong performance from our domestic business. It is led by women's health and cardio and aided by derma. I'm very happy to inform that as far as the organic growth of the quarter is concerned, it is 10%, and if we exclude HCM, which went off patent, then the growth is 12%. Happy to inform that the restructuring of our cardio-diabetes business is complete, and we saw a return to normalization during the quarter.
We expect this restructuring to drive growth going forward. Key brands saw double-digit growth in the quarter, as in Oropho XT, Maxpro, POS, Proxim, Oxfam, Velta, Tenexte, and Somex. All these key brands saw strong double-digit growth in the quarter which has ended. As I have been telling all along, Emcure's strength is its differentiated portfolio, which again helped our Q4 growth and will drive faster-than-industry growth in the current year. Let me now focus on some of the key portfolio expansions that we are doing as far as domestic market is concerned. In women's health, we launched a portfolio of products in menopause and PCOS segment. First-time offering doctors and patients a comprehensive portfolio to address the unmet needs in these segments. I'm referring to menopause and PCOS. We are also in the process of deepening our presence in gynaecology segment with further launches in FY 2026.
Our derma subsidiary launched its first of differentiated products like PRX Plus and Flonisol. Further pipeline of products which will augment our basket of products over the next 12 months, including some of the first launches that we'll be doing through Enqutex, our derma division. I am also very happy to say that derma division chief, who has come with a background at Galderma because of his deep understanding in the derma business, we are also getting a lot of collaboration opportunities at which we are looking. I am personally very excited about the derma business. I am also very happy to inform that our ready-to-use ophthalmologic Devasizumab for wet AMD with a patented technology is in phase three. It is in phase III, and we expect in the current financial year to launch this particular product, which will be a foray in our ophthalmic segment.
This is a product of its kind, and we are very bullish about this particular product which is coming from our Genova subsidiary, which is dealing in biologics. We have also filed for approval. Our asparaginase in oncology, which will be the first time the product will be available in India. Let me take a few seconds to talk about our asparaginase. The asparaginase that we have currently is imported from China, and it is coming from the natural sources. As far as this particular product is concerned, this has been made in-house. It is very convenient. To that extent, batch after batch, the quality is guaranteed, and it should be extremely useful to patients who are suffering from blood cancer. I'm also happy to inform that we are now well on track to be in the first wave of launches for post-expiry for semaglutide.
As far as semaglutide is concerned, we are absolutely on track and will be in the first wave of launches post-expiration of this particular product. Having spoken about the domestic business, now let me turn my attention to the international market, which has shown strong growth in the current year. The rest of the market grew by 27% in FY 2024. The rest of the market, that means through emerging market, grew by 27% in FY 2024. FY 2026 should also see strong growth by traction in our differentiated portfolio, especially in biosimilars and amphotericin B. Amphotericin B going forward, as I also mentioned last time, should be going forward a game changer for us in the emerging market. As far as Canada is concerned, it continues to outperform. In FY 2024, the growth was 35%, including full-year Mantra performance. Base business continues to grow healthy double digits.
Base business continues to grow healthy double digits. We have a very healthy pipeline, and we expect this business to continue to see strong performance going ahead. Now, let me focus on the European Union. I mean, as I told some time back, we got approval for amphotericin B liposomal for the European market, and I'm very happy to inform my shareholders and you analysts that this is the first generic to get approval in the European Union. It's a very big achievement. It's a very complicated product, complex molecule, complex injectable, and this is the first generic approval in the European market. We also acquired Manx Healthcare portfolio. This will help us to expand our product range, basket of products that we offer in the U.K., and will give us a very strong pipeline going forward.
We expect growth of the European Union to be driven by amphotericin B and Manx portfolio. I am also happy to say that as far as the European is concerned, we also have, the way I mentioned about Canada, a fairly robust product pipeline which should also get approved in due course of time. With near-term product pipeline intact, we have recently formed a scientific advisory committee which includes globally reputed scientists to help develop our long-term portfolio strategy. Our long-term portfolio strategy, and in the current month itself, we had a meeting in New Jersey of the scientific advisory committee, and there we have got absolutely world-class scientists who are part of the scientific advisory committee. Our focus area is going to be the four areas which I would enumerate. One is the complex injectables.
Second is biosimilars, and the third is new drug delivery routes for existing molecules targeting better efficacy or new indication. The key focus areas will be CNS and derma, and we will also be working on ADC, antibody-drug conjugates. Now, having spoken about various geographies, I spoke about domestic business, I spoke about Canada, I spoke about emerging markets. I also gave you my outlook as far as what we have done in Europe. Now, let me focus as far as FY 2025-FY 2026 is concerned, the outlook. Key focus area will be on execution. I am a strong believer in execution because everyone has strategies, but the key to success is execution, and also the focus will be on improving our profitability. We expect to see a top-line growth of 13%-14% in FY 2026 with around 150 basis points margin improvement, which will happen over the course of the year.
I know that the bottom line is required to be improved, and my entire team, entire management team is committed to work in that direction. I would also like to highlight that everyone is speaking about the U.S. tariff and pharma pricing. As you know, while listing the company, before listing the company, we demerged our American business. To that extent, we are largely instigated from the vagaries of the U.S. market, and post our demerger, the exposure to U.S. is less than 3%. I mean, I must say that it has been a year since Emcure got listed on stock exchange. From a small family, we have grown into a larger family of investors. We have our dreams and our own responsibilities. For me, it is Emcure 2, which is a new company. I started this company. I'm a founder member. Till we got listed, it was Emcure 1.
Now it is Emcure 2. It is a new company, and we are obviously focusing on higher growth with better margins and much, much higher ROC target. At Emcure, we have charted a five-year roadmap in which 2025-2026 will be our first year of that vision. We hope to have a reasonably strong year ahead of us with many challenges that will be announced at an appropriate time. I can only tell you that we at Emcure are very excited with the opportunities lying ahead of us and fully focused on building a strong team to execute whatever opportunities are there. India stands out well in global context, and Emcure looks ready to seize the opportunity. As far as the pharma is concerned, and with focus on domestic emerging markets, Europe, and Canada, we are well poised to take the opportunities which will come our way.
We hope to keep reporting stronger and better numbers as we go along year after year, and we would also like you to judge Emcure's performance on an annual basis rather than every quarter. All I can say while signing off is that the best of Emcure is yet to come, and we are all committed. My team member of entire Emcure is committed to give great value to the shareholders. With that, I would turn to Taj.
Good afternoon, everyone. Thank you for joining us today. I will take you through some of the key financial highlights for the fourth quarter, 4Q 2025, and full-year FY 2025. The fourth quarter highlights: Revenue from operations for the quarter grew by 19.5% year-over-year to INR 2,116 crore, up from INR 1,771 crore in Q4 FY 2024.
The domestic business grew strongly by 25% year-over-year to INR 9.29 billion crore, driven by early benefits from division restructuring and the addition of Sanofi's portfolio, despite a decline in HCM. Excluding Sanofi, domestic growth was around 10% year-over-year, and excluding HCM, impact was 12%. International markets maintained solid momentum, growing 16% year-over-year to INR 11.87 billion crore, led by rest of the world markets and a strong presence in Canada and Europe. RW markets grew impressively by 39% year-over-year to INR 4.81 billion crore, with strong contributions from both ARV and non-ARV portfolios. Canada reported a 6.1% growth to INR 3.10 billion crore. Europe saw a modest growth of 2% year-over-year, reaching INR 3.96 billion crore. Gross margins for the quarter stood at 57.8%, down from 62.1% in quarter four of FY 2024, impacted by changes in business and product mix.
EBITDA, excluding other income, grew 25.2% year-over-year to INR 390 crore, with EBITDA margins at 18.4%, supported by operating leverage and productivity gains, even amid low gross margins. Depreciation and amortization was flat quarter over quarter at INR 97 crore. Finance cost was INR 39 crore, reflecting lower borrowings. QOQ cost is higher due to one-time cost of INR 10 crore related to early payment. The effective tax rate stood at around 25%. Profit after tax came in at INR 197 crore, showing strong growth of 63% year-over-year. Now, I'll talk about the full-year FY 2025 highlights. Revenue from operations grew 19% year-over-year to INR 7,896 crore. The domestic business grew 16.4% to INR 3,660 crore, supported by the Sanofi portfolio. Ex-HCM and ex-Sanofi domestic growth was around 8%-9%. International markets grew 20% to INR 4,236 crore, with strong performance from Canada and emerging markets.
Canada grew to INR 1,252 crore, benefiting from robust base business performance and the Mantra acquisition. RW markets rose 28% to INR 1,510 crore, with sustained growth in both ARV and non-ARV segments. Europe grew at 4% to INR 1,474 crore, solidifying its base. Gross margins for the year were at 60.1%, a decline from 62.8% in FY 2024, primarily due to Sanofi and ARV product mix. EBITDA, excluding other income, grew 19.4% year-over-year to INR 1,469 crore, with EBITDA margins remaining stable, aided by operational efficiency gains. Depreciation and amortization rose to INR 384 crore from INR 312 crore in FY 2024, owing to Mantra acquisition and commissioning of a few plants. Finance cost for the year stood at INR 176 crore, reflecting lower borrowing levels, inclusive of AS 116 and Mantra-related costs. The effective tax rate for FY 2025 was 27%. PAT stood at INR 707 crore, a growth of 34.1% year-over-year.
The board has recommended a dividend of INR 3 per share. On the balance sheet side, net debt was reduced to INR 488 crore, a significant improvement from INR 1,558 crore in FY 2024. Our working capital days remained stable at approximately 98 days. With that, I'll now open the floor for questions.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touchstone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Amlan Jyoti from Nomura. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hi sir. First of all, congratulations on the numbers.
My first question is regarding the margin expansion that you said in FY 2026 of around 150 basis points. Could you please clarify how do you plan to achieve this next year?
Yeah. I think it's a combination of factors. Obviously, we have operating leverage as the business continues to scale, higher productivity from some of the recently hired field force, and in particular, some of the newer divisions. Of course, some of the restructuring we did vis-à-vis the cardio-diabetic division and the Sanofi portfolio, along with our own cardio products, will also lead to some ongoing synergies. It is also going to be driven by some of the mix of some of the newer product launches, which will bring in better gross margin profile. As we highlighted in the current year, we had a healthy mix of ARV business, but obviously, that comes with a slightly lower gross margin profile.
As some of the faster parts of the international business and non-ARV components in the emerging markets, Canada, and Europe continue to scale, that'll also drive margin expansion on the gross margin side as well. I think a combination of these efforts, which the management team is very focused on, is what's going to drive that 150 basis points expansion that we have emphasized for next year.
Thank you, sir. Regarding the restructuring that you were talking about, has it been completed or will this be restructuring-related cost for a couple of more quarters, right?
Yeah. No, the restructuring is completed. There was no cost as such. It was more a realignment of the field force and the division so that we can basically offer a wider basket of portfolio consisting of both Emcure's products and some of the Sanofi brands.
We think that with that sort of increased focus, what will happen, hopefully, is that we will see better uptake in terms of the entire basket being offered, and that should lead to continued growth and productivity from that field force.
Okay, sir.
Thank you. Very interesting questions.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, you may press star and one to ask a question. The next question is from the line of Alankar Garude from Kotak Institutional Equities. Please go ahead.
Hi, good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for the opportunity. Sir, can you broadly divide the 13%-14% year-on-year top-line guidance across domestic and international?
Yes. I think for what we will be looking at, the domestic, the target is to grow 200 basis points higher than the industry. That will be about your low double-digit type of growth.
I think international is where we are expecting more around a mid-teens type of growth.
Understood. And there, Piyush, would it be fair to say that the Orufer, HCM, LOE impact is now completely behind us?
There is still some impact, as I think in the readout also, there is still about a 1%-2% impact in the quarter. I think that we will be able to manage it out. Even in this quarter, if you look at it, HCM, we grew at 12%, including HCM, we grew to 10%. Namita, if you want to add on that.
In fact, in the HCM, the prices have stabilized, and we are also seeing market share increases because there was an influx of smart players, and quite a few of them have exited at this point. HCM will now have an upside.
Got it.
The other question was on Sanofi. Post the restructuring, can you talk a bit about what has changed in the business? You touched upon it briefly in your opening remarks. Also, if you could quantify it, in the sense when you had acquired it, the sales were broadly around INR 500 crore. There was this restructuring over the past six-seven months. Firstly, what were Sanofi's sales in FY 2025? Secondly, what is your expectation from the portfolio given all the changes?
I think this year, Sanofi's sales would have been about INR 440 crore-INR 450 crore. There was also impact. What we had is because there were a few products which are in shortages. That impacted us. I think going forward, Namita, if you can highlight what we're looking at.
In Sanofi, for a large period of time, they had not been spending promotional expenses on some of their legacy and key products like Cardiff. What we have done is we've taken a lot of our cardio-related KOLs and invested heavily in education activities, scientific meetings, which was not done for several years on Cardiff. The second thing is we've done cross-pollination, as we had committed, which is some of our Emcure strong cardio portfolio, cardio products. We have now shifted to that team so that there is that cross-learning and cross-pollination of products, as well as we have added reps in that team and added headquarters in that team. Overall, we started off by spending more and then shifted some of our brands and then added reps and territory. It's been a very calibrated and structured approach towards the Sanofi project initiative.
That's right, Namita. If you can talk about how quickly should we get back to normalized growth in the Sanofi business, or it's already done, given that you spoke about restructuring having been completed? Should we expect a pretty strong growth right from the current quarter, the first quarter of FY 2026?
I think Piyush has already explained about how when you compare Q4 to Q3, you already saw that growth in domestic business, which was primarily because of the restructuring efforts. He also gave guidance for the following year, where we said we'll be 200 basis points over the market. I think it's fair to say that these two numbers are representative of all the efforts that we've put in, and let's hope for the best.
Got it. Maybe one final question before I come back in the queue.
A clarification on firstly the margin guidance. You spoke about 150 basis points over the course of the year. Just wanted to clarify if you can clarify whether this is a full-year guidance or the exit numbers.
No, this will be a full-year guidance.
Got it. On gross margins, Piyush, quite low both sequentially as well as year-on-year in this quarter. Can you help explain the reasons for the change?
This is largely driven by a mix, right? If you look at sequentially, a big part is the Sanofi and some of the higher ARV sales. Sorry, in my volume or area? Sequentially, I think it is more the product mix, especially as we have on the international side.
If I can just chime in. Year-over-year, I think it is about a 250 basis points reduced GC compared to the prior year-over-year quarter.
Like you said, that's predominantly driven by the Sanofi and ARV component being relatively higher this year vis-à-vis last year. The base business gross margins are actually up slightly compared to prior year Q4. On a sequential basis, he's right. It's more of a mix of domestic versus international, some of the timing aspects of that. I think in terms of the gross margin profile of the business, other than some of these mix issues, we feel very good about where the business is. Like I said, the pipeline is going to continue to drive that margin upwards.
Sorry, to hop on this, you spoke about the sequential decline in margins linked to the domestic mix, domestic-international mix. Given the sharper domestic growth in this quarter, was this a bit surprised with the sequential decline in gross margins?
Was it the case that ARV sales were higher in Q4 as well?
So not just ARV. I think what happens in some of the emerging markets, there are the business mix, right? There is some distribution business, some third-party business where your GCs will be lower, but you do not have a big HCMA. So that product mix plays out in full view.
Understood. Yeah. That is it from my side. Thank you.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, you may press star and one to ask a question. A reminder to all the participants that you may press star and one to ask a question. The next question is from the line of Gagan from Ask Investments Manager. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Good evening. I hope I am audible.
Sir, I would like you to please use your handset.
Okay. Yeah. Is t his better?
Yes, sir. Yeah. Go ahead, Gagan.
Yeah.
On your Canada sales for the fourth quarter, it dipped sequentially from INR 352 crore to INR 310 crore. Is it just a quarterly phenomenon and not much to read in it?
Yeah. For Canada, I think you had mentioned last quarter also that last quarter was a bit heavy because there were some sales which got pre-phone booking. That impacted in full view. I think what you mentioned is if you look at for the full year, the base business count will be growing mid to high teens for us in FY 2025.
Okay. When you say base business, you mean both your entities together? Yeah. Okay. All right. Is it possible to give the eCPM for the quarter and compare it with the third quarter of the year and fourth quarter of the previous year?
Sure. For the quarter, we were at 6.3%.
Last quarter, it was 6.1% in Q3. Last year, same quarter, we were at 5.4%. 5.4%.
Right. Is it also possible to further sort of enumerate, while you mentioned higher growth in your exports, is it possible to give some flavor of how it splits up between ROW, EU, and Canada in terms of growth for FY 2026?
I think Europe, what we will be targeting is around the high single digits. Canada, as I said, we continue to aspire to grow in your teens level. Emerging markets is where we see the substantial growth of closer to 20% or.
Okay. That should be driven more by your non-ARV piece going ahead.
Yes. That is correct. That is correct.
Okay. Okay. For the year, your operating cash flows are lower compared to last year despite fairly strong growth. Can you perhaps explain a little more there?
Yeah.
You see the Sanofi business and higher business are working capital requirements went up, and that's the reason you see the operating cash flows being a little lower.
Okay. And going ahead, in terms of working capital, you indicated it was fairly stable. I was just wondering.
Yeah. It was from 96, it's gone to 98 days, but the business has also grown. In value terms, the working capital value has gone up.
Yeah. I get that. I get the absolute value thing. Is working capital likely to remain stable, or because working capital might be different in the export markets compared to the domestic markets, are we therefore looking at FY 2026 being a year where working capital in days would perhaps rise?
No, it would be the same. It's similar, about 98-100 days is what we're looking at. 98-100 days. Right.
Yeah.
Thanks. I'll get back in the queue. Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Dhawal from Jefferies Group. Please go ahead.
Hi, team. Thank you for taking my question. I just wanted to know what are you guys doing in the ADC area, and do we have the tech or will be relying on some partnerships? What will be the key geographies? In the next two years, are there key molecules that are nearing patent expiry in any of the key markets? That's my first question.
Sure. Hi, this is Samit. Specifically talking about ADC, I think this is the first opportunity for us in terms of real collaboration between our biologics arm and the small molecules, given that we start off with an antibody that will be made by Genova and then have the linker and payload from the chemistry side.
In that context, we are already evaluating the landscape and doing some preliminary trial work. As and when we develop the product, it will definitely be something that we will be looking at global in the sense of India plus emerging markets because that is the kind of opportunity we see here. The IP landscape in this context is quite open. It is not a biosimilar we are looking at. This will be more where we will have some kind of our own IP protection through a novel linker.
The development will require clinical trials, right?
Absolutely.
It will require, in my understanding, phase one, two, and three.
Here we are evaluating some collaboration opportunities as well and also looking at outsourcing some of the elements of the entire clinical pathway.
Okay. Got it. Possible to quantify our ARV sales in FY 2025?
Within the segment, do you see any risk in a three- to five-year period because of launch of new molecules coming up in emerging market? I
'll just answer on the split. About roughly half of our rest of the world sales is ARV. Samit, you want to talk about the product type?
Sure. I think if at all the treatment paradigm changes over the next two to five years, which is likely, I think we are best positioned because of the fact that we are one of the only six licensees for Lenacapavir. Eventually, if the treatment shifts from a TLD to Lenacapavir, I think we will have the opportunity to encash on both.
Yeah. I think obviously we'll be vertically integrated on Lenacapavir. The fact that this may be prescribed prophylactically as well gives us a huge advantage.
We think we're well positioned even for the medium term on the ARV segment.
I believe in the next year, the Lenacapavir should be profitable, I believe, because there will not be very many players going forward.
Makes sense. Last question. For the past two years, I've seen a trend where 1Q is registering the best gross margin, and over the quarter, it's in a declining trend. What's been the reason behind it? Do you expect there's some seasonality, or it was because of various different portfolio mix, and there's no particular trend?
Yeah. I think our international business does tend to be a little bit more back-ended towards the year.
To that extent, particularly as Canada has continued to scale aggressively, and when we look at even some of the emerging parts of the business, I think international business as a whole vis-à-vis domestic market, and then within that, some of these segments, that's why you see a little bit of this mix issue happening as you go through the four quarters. Beyond that, nothing else.
I think it depends on the product mix. That's why I said I think GCs you probably look at for the full year because between quarters, depending on what product mix happens in a quarter, they will be varied, you'll see.
Okay. Just on the GC, oil prices have gone down quite materially. Many of the raw materials are multiple derivatives of these crude products.
Are we seeing some moderation in raw material prices, or there's no impact?
No, I think except for some of the solvents, we are not seeing crude prices impacting anything. Hopefully, it does help us with some of our logistics costs, which have really shot up over the last four or five years. In RMs per se, barring few solvents, we're not really seeing that impact happening.
Okay. Thank you. That answers my question.
Thank you.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Girish Bakhru from OrbiMed . Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi. First question was again on ADC side.
Sorry to interrupt. I would request you to please use your handset.
You're on the handset. Can you hear me?
Yes.
Hello?
Much better now. Yes.
Yeah. Sorry.
Just on the ADC side, if you could elaborate, what is the I know you talked about some IP-based linker, but is there a full library or suite of products that you are planning under Genova and MDR?
No, it'll be a very calibrated approach. I think at least initially, it'll be a very low-risk strategy in terms of choosing an antibody and a payload which is already tested, which is why I said the IP will come through the linkers. Also in terms of payload, most of the people are using derivatives of certain approved molecules. That is the pathway we will follow as well. Once we have product in market, that's when I think we'll go a little more aggressive in creating, like you're mentioning, a library of products there.
You are doing conjugation yourself as well?
Sorry. I don't understand.
I'm sorry.
Could you just repeat that question?
Sorry. I was asking, are you doing conjugation as well of antibody to the payload linker?
Oh, absolutely. The entire integration will be in-house, starting with the antibody, the linker, the payload, as well as the conjugation and achieving the desired dash.
Okay. Okay. And the Asparaginase product you mentioned last time, also the recombinant one, is it different from PEG Asparaginase because that is already launched, right?
Yes. So I'll just give you some insight there. The natural product that comes from China is L-Asparaginase. Today, the product that is in market is the PEG-ylated version of L-Asparaginase. However, that is the second-line treatment in pediatric ALL. The first line continues to be L-Asparaginase, and that's the one which has severe quality issues. That's the one we have made into recombinant.
Recombinant Asparaginase will be the first line, and second line will continue to be the PEG L-Asparaginase.
Okay. This will be the first, you'll be the only player. You do not see any competition here?
Not in the recombinant. Right now, at least from whatever publicly available data on SCC or CDH2, it looks like on the recombinant, we are the only filers. Of course, globally, Spectrila is the brand which is from Medac Germany, and our bio studies have been performed against that product.
Given the current currency, the market, I do not know the market. What is the market for Asparaginase right now in India?
A couple of things. There is both Asparaginase usage happening in India, but this Asparaginase API, after being imported from China, is being formulated and supplied to multiple countries.
Totally, that market, in our estimates, between India and these exports, could be in the range of INR 100 crore-INR 150 crore. INR 100 crore to INR 150 crore. The estimate that we see from export data and Indian data.
Export data. At the same time, a lot of this formulated Asparaginase is being exported to emerging markets. That's where sending a recombinant molecule, which is technically and qualitatively much further than what is going right now, should help us going forward.
Understood. Just a bit on the domestic side, I know Emcutix is very, it's not that old a subsidiary right now, but can you talk about how many portfolios will come under it in terms of the number of products and how much percentage is actually cosmetic derma?
This is a fledgling company. We started its operations early in the month of January.
I mean, but I must tell you that the chief executive that we have, he comes from great background. And to be honest with you, when I started this division, I didn't know that as far as derma market is concerned, it consists of so many things. My understanding was that derma is concerned typically what we promote to the dermatologists, and that's where we talk about atopic dermatitis or for that matter, fungal infection, alopecia, and so forth and so on. Now I understand there is something much beyond that that cosmetology is doing fabulously well. Even for that matter, we also have products for geriatric or even for that matter, products which are required for anti-pollution. All these areas we are entering. With Italian collaboration, we have very recently launched about which I spoke, that is PRX Plus.
The PRX Plus has been launched, and only a couple of days back, I presented from my Chief Executive. This particular product is for skin tightening. For skin tightening, the conventional treatment is not conventional. People use Botox, and they have injections, and all these things are required to be given. This particular product is immensely liked by the dermatologists, and we launched only a month back. We have almost 290 doctors who have started prescribing this particular product. This is essentially coming in the field of cosmetology. This is just one example I am giving you. To that extent, we as a company, we are very excited about the foray in the dermatology. A lot of things, lots of things will happen going forward.
Yeah.
In terms of launches, I think the number of SKUs will be much higher, but we already have about eight brands, and there'll be another six in the pipeline which will come over the next 12 months.
These eight that we are talking have just recently been launched. It is a fairly robust portfolio for the next fiscal year.
One of the products that we launched is also with new technology for acne. This technology is microsphere. This is a product which is significantly better than the existing products that is for acne, then acne moisturizer, then acne spot remover, all these things that we are doing.
Yeah. In terms of cosmetic cosmoderma versus prescription, I think it will be an equal spread between the two.
Equally spread. Okay.
Just also on the split across therapies, if I see three, four years down the line, do you think the contribution from HIV and iron products should significantly change and derma and other therapies should increase?
I think HIV will come down significantly. Iron, yeah. As I think some of the CNS derma option come in, iron will still decrease. Even in iron, I think we see a significant growth potential still.
I think iron as a percent will go down because others grow, but in absolute numbers, we still see huge growth potential in iron.
Would you like to say something, Namita, on iron? Since you are promoting, I would like to hear from you.
I mean, 57% women are anemic, and 30% men are anemic.
There is a huge potential in terms of just people who are not aware that they need it. I think the market will continue to grow. Like you mentioned earlier, we are also increasing our presence in menopause, PCOS, and endometriosis, which are three areas that are rapidly growing. It will be a two-pronged strategy of whatever is big, make it bigger, and then also have some exciting new launches in these progressive markets.
Thank you. Thank you. That is very helpful.
Thank you. The next follow-up question is from the line of Gagan from Ask Investment Manager. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Thanks for taking the follow-up. The first one is on debt. Do we see, I mean, to what scale do we see debt reduction in 2026? And barring inorganics, do we see becoming debt-free by closing the financial year 2026?
Yeah.
We probably see being debt-free by the end of financial year 2026.
Right. In terms of your CapEx, is it possible to enumerate the budget for 2026 and 2027 if that is also possible?
Yeah. I think we have historically guided to probably in the range of about INR 350 crore. I think we will be somewhere in that range, give or take INR 25-50 crore.
Right. Also, you in the last quarter talked of quite a few in-licensing programs which might come to fruition in the short term. Any further elaboration on any of these if they are due in financial year 2026 and in which areas?
We have the Emcutix, the PRX Plus, which we launched as one of those in-licensed products that we have. Others, I do not think there is anything we can talk about.
Okay. Thanks.
Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.
The next follow-up question is from the line of Alamkar Kharude from Kotak Institutional Equities. Please go ahead.
Rishbhai, you mentioned about being well on track to being the first wave of launches for semaglutide in India. Given that you are vertically integrated here, does it mean that this confidence is coming basis on the progress on the trials? I'm just asking this because we hear mixed feedback about the difficulty in clearing the trials even in India.
I would love somebody to take that question.
No. Absolutely. I think in terms of the timelines on the trials, we are on track. We also are quietly confident about the probability of success on these trials. I think one uncontrollable is the speed of regulatory clearance. That's something we really need to make sure goes as per plan to be able to be in this first wave.
At least whatever is under our control in terms of the trial timelines as well as probability of success, we think we have the molecule well understood.
Have we filed in Canada yet?
Not yet, but that is actively on the cards.
Okay. The second question was, if you look at the XARV ROW sales growth, assuming ARV was half of the ROW sales in FY 2025, the XARV growth seems to be in low single digits. You spoke about strong growth in ROW in FY 2026, and possibly the margin guidance also alludes to a lower ARV mix in FY 2026. One is, what drove the relatively lower growth XARV in ROW in FY 2025, and what will change secondly in FY 2026?
XARV growth was in pink, not in single digits, but as in FY 2025.
I think going forward in terms where we have a lot more confidence in terms of the visibility for the product approvals that we are getting for some of our differentiated products like Amphotericin B or even some of the biosimilars. It is led by those approvals going through.
Okay. What was the ARV sales number in FY 2024 in ROW?
ARV, what have been? Just give me one second. What have been? Less than 40%. So around 40% odd. Slightly higher than 40%.
Okay. Okay. The other question was on this acquisition, recent acquisition of Manx. Any clarification on the size as well as the margin profile of this asset?
Yes. Yeah. We are expecting this year to have sales close to $15 million to begin with. We have a portfolio of about 100 molecules which we have acquired.
Out of that portfolio that we acquired, there's obviously at least about 40% or so that are already commercial molecules approved. That's where we're confident about the sales emanating from these ongoing sort of molecules where we even as part of the transaction took on some component of inventory and then will continue in terms of selling those products. I think what's exciting is for our ability to take some of the yet-to-be-approved molecules and be able to commercialize those as well going forward.
Understood. What is the margin profile of Manx at the moment?
Again, I mean, we acquired the entire portfolio. We think that that'll give us reasonably good EBITDA margins in line with what we would be expecting for the overall Europe portfolio.
Got it. One final question. What has been the organic growth in Canada in FY 2025?
It would have been about mid to high teens.
Understood. Yeah. Very helpful backfit from my side. Thank you.
Thank you. A reminder to all the participants that you may press star and one to ask a question. The next question is from the line of Shah from Ask Investment Manager. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi. So you talked about growing the turnover in the current year, 2025, 2026, by about 13-14%, hopefully more in the higher end, and the increment of margins by about 150 basis points, which about 19.5% for the year gone by to about 21%. Both on the top line as well as on the margin improvement, is the year following also we have some such ambition, or this is confined only for the current year 2025, 2026?
Yeah. I just want to make one small correction.
Our full year—10,000 gross turnover in 2026, 2027? I just want to make one small correction to your question, and then I'll take the question. I think our full year EBITDA margins was closer to 18.5%, not 19.5%, as you mentioned. If you include other income, then yes, you get closer to 19.5%. You're right that the 150 basis points that we are guiding to is on top of that number, in that range of 20%-21%, depending on whether you include the other income or not.
When it comes to looking at more of a two to three-year outlook, we fully appreciate and understand that when you look at some of the peers in the industry, we still feel that we have further room to improve on the margin aspects of the business. There is a lot of effort, as I mentioned, being put on that. We firmly believe that as the business continues to grow, there is no reason why we should not continue to see enhanced margin profile even two to three years out. I think in the past, we have also guided to over a three to four-year period, probably a 300-400 basis point sort of improvement in the margin profile of the business.
While I don't want to give any specific number, but suffice it to say that off of our exit, if we aspire to grow 13% or 14% next year and would still have ambitions to grow double digits organically the year after, and of course, we're going to continue to look for M&A opportunities and in-licensing opportunities, so we're very, very bullish about crossing certain milestones a couple of years out.
Which means that this 13%-14% growth that you outlined for the current year FY 2026, similar journey should be expected for 2026-2027. Whether margins will improve by 150 basis points or not, like in the FY 2026, but some further improvement in margins is what you are envisaging for the year going ahead.
I think directionally, I would agree with that.
However, I think let's go through the course of the year, and we'll certainly continue to give updated guidance for forward.
As I mentioned in my opening remarks, we have long-term players. We are committed to creating great value for the share growth the next five years. Now we are essentially focused on the current year. To that extent, as I mentioned in my earlier remarks, the entire emphasis will be on execution to ensure that whatever guidance we are giving in terms of 13%-40% whether we have growth and 150 basis points increase in EBITDA, that's what we are committed to. It's going to be a mix of short-term and mid-term and long-term. Long-term, of course, the expirations are there to get into a big league.
I think we have time for probably one or maximum two more questions.
Yeah.
Only just one last point there. Since on all key competitive factors or aspects, you would agree that MQ is still behind some of the other firms. Therefore, we need to try harder, I would say.
Yeah. As I mentioned, I think it's obviously if you look at the various components of our business mix, the endeavor is always to maximize the potential of each of the different segments. Certainly, along with growth, the margin expansion is very much on top of the senior management's minds. I think we can move on.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, you may press star and one to ask a question. A reminder to all the participants that you may press star and one to ask a question. The next follow-up question is from the line of Thawil from Jefferies Group. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, sir. Just one doubt.
We have recently set up this MQ Generics Private Limited. What is that? Is it about entering trade generics, or is it something else?
Yes. Yeah. So I mean, we've made a limited beginning, but obviously, with the trade generics, the profile of that business, we feel that it's important to have that housed in a separate entity with a separate team. Obviously, it has its own channel. We will have a very, very calibrated approach, but certainly, we are also going to be present in a limited way in the trade generic segment as well.
Okay. Thank you. That's it from my end.
Thank you. As there are no further questions from the participants, I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Piyush Nahar for closing questions.
Thank you all for joining today's investor call.
If any of your queries still remain unanswered, please feel free to get in touch with us. Thank you. Have a good day.
Thank you. On behalf of Emcure Pharmaceuticals, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your line.