Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to Q1 FY 2026 earnings conference call hosted by Grasim Industries Limited. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in the listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during this 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. Ankit Panchmatia, Head of Investor Relations of Grasim Industries. Thank you, and over to you, Ankit.
Thank you, Nito. Good evening, and thank you for joining Grasim's first quarter financial year 2026 earnings call. The financial statements, press release, and presentation are already uploaded on the website of stock exchanges and our website for your reference. For safe harbor, kindly refer to the cautionary statement highlighted in the last slide of our presentation. We have with us our management team on this call to discuss our results and business performance. We have with us Mr. Himanshu Kapania, Managing Director; Mr. Pavan Jain, Chief Financial Officer; and Mr. Hemant Kadahil, Incoming Chief Financial Officer of Grasim Industries. From businesses, we have with us Mr. Jayant Dhobley, Business Head, CFI Business; Mr. Rakshit Hargave, CEO of Birla Opus, our Paints Division; and Mr. Sandeep Kumaraveli, CEO of Birla Pivot, our B2B e-commerce business; and Mr. Manmohan, from Cellulosic Fibers Business.
Let me now hand over the call to Mr. Himanshu Kapania for his opening remarks. Over to you, sir.
Good evening from India to all the participants across the globe, and thank you for joining the call. Over the past one year, the global economic landscape has evolved rapidly, shaped by shifting global trade dynamics and policy responses. Let me highlight key developments across global growth, tariff policies, and contrasting parts of advanced and developing economies. Firstly, on global growth, in the past year, the global economy has shown moderate but uneven resilience. Growth has slowed slightly, with the global GDP expanding at just under 3%, reflecting the lagged effects of tight monetary policy in major economies and geopolitical tensions that have weighed on investment sentiment. Inflation, while cooling in most advanced economies, remains above central bank targets, keeping interest rates elevated. The U.S. Federal Reserve and European Central Bank maintain a cautious stance through much of the past year, wary of premature rate cuts.
This has led to tighter global financial conditions and subdued credit growth. New supply chain disruptions, such as the Red Sea shipping tensions and sanctions, have added fresh layers of uncertainty. Secondly, tariffs and trade policy shifts were one of the most notable changes in the past year. The escalation of trade protectionism has reinforced a trend of fragmentation of global trade into regional blocs. Many countries are now actively reassuring critical industries, prioritizing geopolitical alignment over pure cost efficiency. Even within regions, we are seeing trade barriers rise not in the form of just tariffs, but also export restrictions on strategic minerals, technology controls, and state subsidies linked to domestic production. Thirdly, diverging growth tendencies. The divergence in economic momentum between advanced and developing economies has become more pronounced over the past year. The U.S. economy, despite tightening monetary policy, has surprised on the upside, with higher consumer spending.
Our growth is expected to slow below 2% in year 2025. Europe and Japan, in contrast, have seen sluggish recoveries, with weak industrial output, stagnant wages, and fragile business confidence. Meanwhile, the real momentum has shifted to developing Asia. China's GDP growth is projected at around 4.8%, reflecting a continued structural slowdown amid cyclic headwinds, especially in the property and consumer sectors. Export momentum has also weakened due to heightened trade restrictions and new tariffs, especially from the U.S. and EU. India, on the other hand, continues to lead global growth amongst major economies, with GDP projected to expand by 6.8%, driven by stable domestic demand, higher infrastructure spending, and sustained exports.
Inflation, although sticky early in the year, has moderated to 4.3% by mid-2025, allowing the RBI to shift gears from tight monetary stance to a more neutral and growth-oriented policy, enacting three consecutive rate cuts, totaling 100 basis points in the current calendar year. In summary, the past one year has underscored a few key themes: moderate global growth, with clear divides between advanced economies slowing down and emerging markets accelerating, a series of sweeping trade tariffs, redefinition of global trade patterns, and supply chain realignments, and the ongoing tensions between economic integration and national security priorities. As we look ahead, the need for adaptive policy frameworks, regional partnerships, and investment in sustainable, inclusive growth models has never been more urgent. Grasim Industries continues to harness the strength of its diversified business portfolio, seamlessly aligning with India's robust growth trajectory.
Backed by a legacy of building large-scale, future-ready businesses, Grasim Industries is well-positioned to cater to the rising demands of a dynamic Indian economy. Riding this growth wave, we are proud to share that Grasim Industries has delivered 20 consecutive quarters of year-on-year revenue growth, achieving an impressive 15% CAGR since financial year 2021. Our trailing 12-month TTM, consolidated revenue, has crossed a record high of nearly INR 150,000 crore, a testimony to our consistent performance and resilience. While the company's CFO, Mr. Pavan Jain, will be covering key financial highlights, happy to share that we have started the current financial year on a high note, reporting 16% YoY growth in consolidated revenue at INR 40,118 crore.
The standalone revenue for the quarter touched a record high of INR 9,223 crore, up 34% YoY, led by high growth from new businesses, paint and B2B e-commerce, coupled with staple core businesses, cellulosic fibers, and chemicals. Consolidated EBITDA stood at INR 6,430 crore, marking a strong growth of 36% YoY, mainly due to higher profitability in cement and chemicals businesses, partially offset by initial investments of building strong consumer-facing paint business, Birla Opus, in line with board-approved business plans. Starting with the new businesses, firstly with paint business, Birla Opus reported double-digit revenue growth on a quarter-on-quarter basis. As per internal estimates, the organized decorative paint industry has grown by over 5% on YoY basis. However, as per our estimates, excluding Birla Opus revenues, the organized decorative paint industry has degrown slightly or remained flattish on a year-on-year basis.
Our belief is that this subdued growth rate is led by push from incumbent industry players for low-end economy products. Nevertheless, Birla Opus continues to believe that the industry market share realignment along capacity lines, consolidation of fringe players, highest-ever manufacturing capacity additions, and increased brand salience will enable the decorative paint industry to return to double-digit growth. The industry is bound to capture the opportunities from rising consumer aspirations and exponential development in infrastructure, especially the housing sector. As per internal estimates, Birla Opus, on its own, is India's number three decorative brand, and when combining the revenues of Birla Opus and Birla White's putty business, similar to the revenue reporting of all paint majors, Aditya Birla Group's presence in decorative paint business has crossed 10% revenue market share.
On the manufacturing front, the trial production of emulsion and water-based paint at Birla Opus' sixth plant in Kharagpur has begun, and commercial launch is on track by the end of quarter two, FY 2026. To emphasize, post the launch of the sixth plant, the Birla Opus' installed capacity will rise to 1,332 million liters per annum, estimated to reach 24% of India's organized paint industry capacity. On the Consumer Engagement front, Birla Opus' Painting Services offered under PaintCraft brand name is being scaled up through a retail network. PaintCraft has been running direct painting services by the company in select cities for the last two years, which is now being extensively expanded to over the top 100 towns in quarter two, FY 2026, through the company's dealer-operated franchises. PaintCraft is a differentiated service offering that is unlike any existing dealer-led painting services model.
The key point that makes it distinct is that the service has been built on a digital platform, which integrates the service for all stakeholders, including companies, dealer franchise, applicator, painter, and consumer. This allows PaintCraft to offer: A, transparent consumer pricing; B, financing on painting; C, end-to-end company oversight of dealer-led painting services through a trained execution network; and D, a fully tax-compliant service. The company remains committed to upgrading consumer painting experience not only in metros and large towns, but also in mid and small towns through Birla Opus PaintCraft services, with a vision to offer consistent quality and affordable painting services with the backing of the company. Separately, our research shows that consumer love for Birla Opus continues to rise as the brand maintains its unique 360-degree integrated, highly salient advertising campaigns.
Recently, the company has launched part two of "Duniya Ko Rang Do ," bringing back adorable Opus boys in animation form. Opus's increased acceptance can be measured through higher uptake of premium and luxury paint products. This quarter, the premium luxury product revenue contribution was maintained at 65% of revenue, covering all categories across emulsion, enamel, wood finish, and waterproofing, including retail and institutional segments. On the distribution front, the focus shifted to improving dealer throughput in terms of revenue by increasing penetration of each category with the onboarded dealers and selling a wider range of SKUs per category. The brand has expanded its pan-India reach to over 8,000 towns in a short span of less than 12 months. The total CapEx spend for paint business stood at INR 9,555 crore as of 30th June 2025.
Grasim is proud of Birla Opus's team to have executed such a large-scale greenfield project of six state-of-the-art plants. Such execution of simultaneous commencement without any cost overrun, lightning pace, production scale up, and delivering first-time right and consistent quality for the entire range of 179 products is a feat unparalleled. This execution further demonstrates the financial discipline and manufacturing and supply chain prowess capability of this new startup organization. Moving on to the second new business, Birla Pivot, the B2B e-commerce business, let me start with the potential of an online platform in the building and construction space. The Indian B2B market presents an untapped opportunity estimated at $2 trillion today and poised to grow at a ferocious pace to $4 trillion by 2030, making it one of the largest globally.
There are over 73 million SMEs growing at 13% annually who are rapidly adopting digital solutions for core business processes like GST compliance, e-way bills, digital payments, and credit excellence. Since its launch in 2023, Birla Pivot has evolved into a comprehensive and trusted B2B e-commerce platform offering integrated procurement and financial solutions that help businesses grow and become more efficient. The Birla Pivot platform today offers a wide range of products across 35 categories, 40,000+ SKUs from 300+ brands. The Birla Pivot team has been successfully building a large network of buyers and sellers and continuously improving its proposition across three core pillars of B2B e-commerce: that is price, assortment, and experience. There has been a steady rise in customers' engagement on its proprietary tech stack, Birla Pivot Suite, which is unique and solves the need of the ecosystem.
The private label across tiles, barware, and plies has been gaining traction, and we are seeing increasing inquiries for these categories. As far as this quarter's performance, the business has delivered another quarter of superior growth rates despite monsoon-led weakness, which impacted a large part of the construction materials segment. The business has grown at high single digits, sequentially led by new customer additions and healthy repeat orders. The business's annualized revenue run rate continues to rise and remains on track to achieve INR 8,500 crores, that is the billion-dollar ambition by FY 2027. Moving on to the cement business, the third revenue stream in Grasim's building materials segment, UltraTech, the performance has been robust with revenue growth of 13% year-on-year. The company added new capacity of 37.4 million tons per annum on a year-on-year basis, with a total capacity domestic and overseas now at 192.3 million tons per annum.
The large annual capacity addition includes greenfield expansion and acquisition of key assets of Kesoram and India Cement Limited business domestically, and RAK at UAE during the last one year. UltraTech Cement continues to stand at the helm of India's infrastructure growth story and contributes to the nation's long-term development goals. The volume growth in the cement industry is estimated at 4% - 5%, and UltraTech continues to outweigh industry growth with volume growth of 10% year-on-year. The operating EBITDA per metric ton grew at a healthy level of INR 1,248 per metric ton, a phenomenal rise of 37% on a year-on-year basis, led by scale benefits and cost optimization. As regards to existing core businesses, including cellulosic fibers, chemicals, renewables, and other businesses, and an overview of company financials, I am now handing over to the Chief Financial Officer, Mr. Pavan , to carry on from here.
Thank you, Mr. Kapania, and good evening to everyone. Cellulosic fiber prices continue to remain resilient compared to other competing fibers like cotton and polyester, which are exhibiting volatility with a downward bias. In H1 of calendar year 2025, there was a demand slowdown globally, including demand in China, resulting in a decline in utilization levels to 82% and increasing inventory to 20 days. With price increases to partially absorb the high input costs, cellulosic fiber revenue grew by 7% YoY to INR 4,043 crore. Just to remind, this segment also has an element of our cellulosic fashion yarn business, where the volumes grew by 6% YoY. The realizations in the cellulosic fashion yarn business continue to remain impacted by lower-priced imports from China.
High input prices, including that of caustic soda, reflected in higher profitability of our chemical segment, partially absorbed by the company, has resulted in a decline in EBITDA by 17% YoY. In the chemical business, revenue grew by 16% YoY at INR 2,391 crore, led by a volume growth of 8% driven by a stable domestic demand scenario. Equity realizations stood flattish on a sequential basis and higher by 10% YoY, led by a stable demand and favorable balance. Specialty Chemical sales volumes stood at record high levels, recording a growth of 6% YoY as the utilization rates of expanded capacities are improving. EBITDA for the chemical business grew by 36% YoY to INR 8,422 crore. The financial services business under Aditya Birla Capital is continuing to focus on embracing customer centricity and driving synergy across verticals.
A key thrust has been on strengthening capabilities in data, digital, and technology, enabling enhanced decision-making, improved customer experience, and greater operational efficiency. For Q1 FY 2026, the business reported revenue growth of 8% YoY, led by housing finance, which was up by 65% YoY, and health insurance, which was up by 31% YoY. The total lending portfolio, which includes NBFC and Housing Finance loan book, grew by 30% YoY to over INR 1,065,000 crore. Amidst declining interest rate movements, the NBFC business witnessed a YoY decline of 59 basis points in the net interest margin. The total assets under management across AMC Life and Health Insurance grew by 20% YoY to over INR 5,053,000 crore. Of this, Life Insurance AUM crossed a milestone of INR 1 lakh crore.
In the renewable business, our total installed peak capacity reached 1.9 GW in Q1 FY 2026, up twofold from 946 MW in June 2024. The business has strong anchored clientele with Aditya Birla Group companies representing 43% of the existing portfolio. On the CapEx front, Grasim Industries has announced a CapEx plan of spending INR 2,263 crore in FY 2026, out of which INR 480 crore has already been spent in Q1 FY 2026. Lyocell project in the Cellulosic Fiber business remains on track to be completed by late 2027. The long lead items orders have been placed, and other orders and contracts are in process. In chemicals, the mechanical completion of two projects, namely ECH and CPVC plant, with Lubrizol, will be completed in Q3 FY 2026. Before we open the floors for Q&A, I would like to share developments on my movement.
As you would be aware, I'm superannuating effective 15th August , 2025, and my colleague, Hemant Kadel, will be taking over as CFO. It's a mixed feeling of pride, gratitude, and emotion being associated with Grasim for more than 20 years and CFO for over three years. It has been a journey of growth, challenge, learning, contribution, and most importantly, collaboration. I've been fortunate to work and interact with some of the brightest minds and committed individuals. Together, we have navigated market cycles, celebrated milestones, weathered uncertainties, and above all, upheld the values that define this company. As I step away, I carry with me not just numbers and reports, but memories, relationships, and the satisfaction of having contributed in some way to this institution's journey.
I would like to add my inflection with many of you as analysts, investors, and observers, as you help shape my knowledge and intellect. I want to thank the board and our leadership team for their constant support and belief in me. To each one of you on this call and friends in the investment world, thank you for the trust, work relations, and shared purpose we have built over the years. Thank you for building such an important association. It has been an honor. I'm confident that the company is in an exciting growth phase, poised for even greater heights. I look forward to watching Grasim Industries' continued success, this time from the sidelines. I now open the floors for Q&A.
Thank you very much. We will now begin with the question- and- answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touch-tone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. Participants, you may press star and one to ask a question. Ladies and gentlemen, you may press star and one to ask a question. The first question is from the line of Mihir Shah from Nomura. Please go ahead.
Hi, sir. Thank you for taking my question. I hope I'm audible.
Yes, you are audible. You are moving.
Perfect. Thank you. The first question is on sales. I wanted to check on your sales momentum in the recent months. My back of the calculation suggests that you've grown about 20% in this quarter on a QoQ basis. Just in the recent months, I wanted to check the momentum. The context of the question is generally brands in the initial phase of the launch see high demand, and then it moderates down in some time as it consolidates before starting again to gain traction, if at all. There are views that Opus is now consolidating and dealers are going back to their old brands. I wanted to know your side of the narrative and in which phase are you in currently. That's my first question.
Thank you, Mihir. Let me answer the first question. As we also declared, quarter-on-quarter is in double digits. The fact is that growth for us continues. We have growth, which is coming from.
Sorry to interrupt you.
Growth continues and growth.
Can you explain from your side when you're not talking, please?
Yeah, sir, go ahead.
Yeah. Growth for us continues. Growth, as you said, comes also from dealers who are being added, but more from dealers who are now giving us more business as countershare. On your query that there is feedback that there is dealer attrition and dealers are going back, I am not able to comprehend that easily because, firstly, let me tell you that apart from the franchises that we have, the majority of our dealers are multi-brand dealers. We are not the first brand in the shop. We are either the second, third, or fourth brand. Most of those dealers continue to be with us and continue to expand our portfolio and sell us more. If one or two dealers have gone back, that should not be taken in the other calls where we have heard that we are having dealer attrition.
The fact is the larger universe and the majority of them continue to grow with us and giving us more countershares. On your question, where are we on the phase? We are purely on the growth phase. While you might say classically there is a growth phase and there is a consolidation phase, we are growing and consolidating both because when we say that our throughput per dealer is going up as a function of deeper penetration, more product, and more range, that obviously means consolidation. The fact that we are still adding some more dealers and increasing our range in each dealer says that we are also growing. That's where we are.
Got it, Rakshit. Thank you for that. That's quite helpful. Secondly, I wanted to know if you can share how is your traction in between the category A, B, C dealers? Where have you seen the most acceptance, and what kind of hurdles are you facing to make inroads in the other ones that you have not been able to get through? A subpart to it is, you know, earlier even you had highlighted during the launch that you will cross 6,000 towns. I see you've crossed already 8,000 towns now. Even your SKU and product mix has crossed the earlier number that you had shared during the launch. Any updated dealer reach or any of the updated numbers that you would like to share? That's my second question.
As we said, we had shared the dealer reach. We had a target of 50,000 dealers in the first year, and we were very close to that. Like I said, we are still adding dealers but consolidating more on existing dealers. You rightly said we had talked about 6,000 towns, but we are close to 8,000 towns. For us, growth continues in this way. We are not sharing any other numbers, but I think these are fair indicators that business is progressing on all fronts in all the geographies.
Got it. Thank you very much. Wishing you all the very best, guys.
Thank you. A request to all the participants, kindly restrict to two questions per participant and join the queue again for a follow-up question. The next question is from the line of Rahul Gupta from Morgan Stanley. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thank you for taking my questions. Two questions. First, just continuing on the previous question, can you help us understand how the competitive landscape has evolved versus last quarter? I remember you mentioned that the economy segment had relatively higher competitive intensity. Just some color on this will be very helpful. That's my first question. Thank you.
Yes. Like we said, the competitive intensity remains. We see that from the competition side, the intensity has increased on the value or the economy segment. The level of discounting has gone up. You can also see from all the other companies that while volume growth is there, the value growth is much lesser than that. Obviously, the action on discounts on the economy segment has been taken up by competition. Like we said, we continue to play very strongly in all the three segments, as you say, luxury, premium, and economy. Himanshu also ratified in his opening speech that the contribution of luxury products, if you assume the full portfolio, for us is close to 65%, which is very, very good, even for an established player, leave aside a new player like Birla Opus.
Got it. Just to follow up on this, how should we look at both volume and value for the rest of this year? I also understand that festive season is earlier this year. Any color that you may provide on this?
If you noted on a QoQ annual basis, the market has grown only at 5%. If you remove Birla Opus, then the market is actually minus one or zero. Obviously, Birla Opus has taken a lion's share of the growth, which has happened on an annualized basis. If you take a look at this year, yes, the market is a little slow. The advancement of rains does not work well for paint business because the exterior business, you know, gets affected. This time, the monsoon, even if at a lower intensity, continues for a longer period, which would mean that the slowness because of the monsoon would still be there. How would the volume growth move ahead in the following quarter? Difficult to predict, but yes, you are right that this time Diwali is earlier.
Corresponding to that, the so-called high sales season period, which has relevance since then, will come before. That should start happening towards the end of August or September. As Birla Opus, we are fully prepared to tackle that successfully, and we see that we should be able to grow well on a continued basis. As far as competition is concerned, it is for them how do they want to play the coming season.
Great. Thank you so much. Just one bookkeeping question. Our math suggests that your reported revenues were around INR 11 billion versus INR 9 billion last quarter. Can you help us understand what kind of revenues were in CWIP?
We appreciate your, you know, doing your maths on your book. Like we said, we will disclose the math at the right moment, as Pavan had promised in the last call also.
Let me flip this question. Is CWIP revenues this quarter materially different versus last quarter?
See, what is CWIP? For factories which have not been capitalized and which are manufacturing, as per accounting laws, the sales from that has to be put in CWIP. Yes, there is our factory Mahad, which was manufacturing. It had products which were manufactured before capitalization, so they would go in CWIP. I would not like to comment on the value, but the fact is, as per accounting standards, on a time scale, it does impact our reported numbers.
Got it. Thank you and all the very best.
Thank you very much. Participants, you may press star and one to ask a question. Next question is from the line of Nirav from Anvil Wealth. Please go ahead.
Yes, sir. Thanks for the opportunity. Sir, two questions on chemicals. One, when we see our YoY numbers for chemicals, EBITDA has gone up by close to around INR 112 crore. Based on the ECU realizations, we are higher by around INR 3.40, which translates to a benefit of close to around INR 103 crore. I just wanted to check here if the benefit from ECU as well as from the renewable share was higher than this INR 103 crore, and there was a degrowth in the profits from the epoxy division. Your thoughts here.
Yes, sir. I'm not completely sure I understand your math, but the end question that you have is what's the degrowth in epoxy profits, right? That is the question you're leading to, so I will answer very directly instead of indirectly. As you know, feedstocks for epoxy, basically BPA, ECH, have been hardening, particularly ACH. You also know that there is an anti-dumping duty on ECH. At the same time, you also know that epoxy comes into ECH through different countries, particularly Korea through FTA arrangements, which basically puts pressure on the epoxy chain. Our approach has been to find the right balance between maintaining market share and maintaining the margins. We do hope that the process that is now running with the government to review different FTAs and the industry representations around that will lead to some positive.
Yes, within the epoxy chain, the industry is in a margin compression, between hardening raw material prices, anti-dumping duty on one hand, and duty-free imports on the other hand. We are making the right balance trade-offs between retaining our margin and ensuring that we don't spoil the market.
Correct. In one of the interactions in the earlier calls, you mentioned that the steady state or the normalized margin for the epoxy business should be anywhere between 15% - 18%. I think with all the factors you mentioned about, the margins in this business possibly would have come closer to 10% or let's say anywhere between those bands. Is it a perfect?
I'm not making comments on that because you know that we also have a large portfolio of specialty epoxy. We make a large number of products, uniquely tailored for automotive, for wind, for anti-corrosion, etc. I would not like to comment on the current state of margins because it's competitively sensitive.
Correct. The second question is on power requirement. I think, based on some back-end calculations, our power requirements.
Sorry to interrupt you. Can you speak a little louder, please?
Am I audible now?
Yes, we are audible.
Yeah. Sir, based on the calculations, I think our power requirement for the chemical business is close to around 350 MW. If you can just help us understand what is the mix between captive renewables and grid, and also if you can share the capacity utilization for the chlorine derivative business. Thank you so much.
The capacity utilization has been slightly above 80% for chlor-alkali . That is the one that you're asking me.
No, sir. I'm specifically asking about VAP.
Oh, definitely. That is a difficult number to give because it's a very complex portfolio, with more than 20 product lines. That is a difficult number to give. Maybe I don't want to disclose that one either.
No worries. Instead, the breakup of 350 MW or whatever may be.
It's a big size. I'll give it to you soon.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Next question is from the line of Prateek Kumar from Jefferies India.
Can you please just give me the power? Sorry, sir. Just give me the power.
Answer to Nita's query, no?
Yeah.
My renewables has reached about 15%.
15, 155.
Which is, I think, the number that you were looking for.
Got it. What would be a CapEx?
Captive and grid would be roughly equal.
Got it. Thank you so much, sir.
Prateek Kumar from Jefferies. Can you proceed with your question?
Yeah, everything. My first question is on your B2B e-commerce segment. The segment has scaled to almost INR 5,000, over INR 5,000 crores of revenue in invent. What is the kind of profitability this segment is doing? Are there any outputs if you can share on the same? Also, this segment was, I mean, the sales keep grew like around some thousand crores of paychecks when this segment was launched. How is the, I mean, how do we see it shifted in the segment and now on the output?
Thanks for the question. This is Sandeep here. On your first question, the revenue growth has been pretty good, and it continues quarter on quarter. As was remarked in the opening comments, we are seeing high single-digit growth sequentially when you compare quarter four to quarter one. You'd asked about profitability. We had earlier mentioned it in our previous quarter calls as well. At a scale of $1 billion, which is what we are estimating that we'll hit in FY 2027, we are confident that we'll break even at that scale. All our indications and our trends right now are pointing towards that, if not sooner. On your second question, Prateek, which is on CapEx and how much have we spent out of the INR 2,000 crore that was announced when we launched the business, our business is a technology business.
We are fundamentally investing in building a technology platform and making sure that all the parts of our value chain are visible to our buyers, our sellers, and everyone else who's participating in the ecosystem. Most of our CapEx so far has largely been in building that technology stack. Without going into the details of how much has been spent, we are well within track as per what we budgeted for. We still remain in that growth phase, and we still continue to invest in building the right technology which will solve for the needs of this B2B universe.
Thank you. My other question is on paint business. Any one-year target or we have a few annual grades start to the financial year. Any one-year target we now have for this business in terms of on revenue or any other metrics specifically?
Like you know, we talked about we gave some metrics for the first year, and then we have anyway given our intention to be what we want to be in the full-scale operation after three years. We don't really have specific targets to share with you for a one-year period, but the journey continues, and we are on track, give or take a few things here, plus or minus. That's how we would want to put it.
Sure. Thank you and all the best.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Nishant from Temasek Holdings. Please go ahead.
Yeah, hi. Just one question on the paint business. What are the credit policy differences that we have versus peers? I.e., do we have a higher indexation to dealers who are more credit-funded versus short-cycle credit?
If you take a look at the overall market and if you take a look at the top three or four players, credit falls somewhere in the center. We are with the market. It's not that we are giving less or more, but the different players have slightly different policies starting from A to B. Our policy would fall somewhere in the average in terms of credit basis.
The second one is in terms of just the, as you go through the brand evolution, how do you track evolution from a transactional business pull-through to a brand-driven business pull-through? How would you sort of assess that evolution?
We have taken some initiatives. One of them is also a first time in the paint industry: we have availability of RMS data, which actually gives us a lot of insight into what is the share that we have across different geographies. Secondly, we also have a good brand tracking mechanism, which shows where we are in terms of total awareness, unneeded awareness, spontaneous awareness, and how we are progressing versus competition on a quarter to quarter. Very soon, we will also get into what you call the consumption funnel and reason, you know, from awareness to usage and why there are dropouts. Like a classical good consumer brand, we are putting these practices into play, and access to this kind of data helps us understand how we are moving better.
Understand. Is there any color that you can share on current sort of awareness data that you may be able to share today?
Yeah. I'll share with you. If you take a look at total awareness, we are already there with the top three brands. If you talk about spontaneous awareness, as per my data, I am already number two and equal to the number two player.
Understand. Okay. Sorry. Spontaneous is unaided awareness.
Spontaneous is you ask someone, which is the one brand that you would want to say?
Understand. Okay. Got it. Okay. Thank you. Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Amir Purohit from Elara Capital. Please go ahead.
Yes, sir. Thank you for the opportunity. Just one on the overall industry demand. You clearly highlighted that the increments have not grown much. How do you see this going forward as we enter into the festive season? Any outlook that you think would find it challenging for us to maintain the growth momentum because the industry demands may be smoother? That was my first question. The second is on PaintCraft. I just wanted to know if this service would be available to all our dealers. Normally, in a typical dealer, what is the share of painting service? I mean, I know not for all dealers it may be, but at least the top dealers that we, in their sales, how do we think about it? This as an enabler to drive further growth.
Let me answer the first question regarding how we see the demand in the upcoming season. The season is slightly advanced this time as compared to the last few years. You should see the festive upswing starting towards the end of this month, and September should be a big month. It is difficult to say how the other plans will play out because currently, the focus is a lot more on the economy segment and discounting. That is going to get you some volume, but that might not get you so much value. As far as we are concerned, we will play the market as it should be. We have a very exciting luxury premium portfolio also. We would focus on that. We are quite confident that we will be able to reap good benefits and continue our quarter-to-quarter growth.
For the others, I think it's up to them as to how they want to focus on themselves and play. On PaintCraft, we were offering PaintCraft as a direct service, as a kind of test market in some cities through service partners. We are now going to take it broader. In the first phase, we will take you to about 100 towns, and we are going to offer it through our franchise dealers. Obviously, during a certain period of time, we will cover a large number of dealers who work with us. Now, how much contribution does come from painting service? We will have to learn that ourselves. As Himanshu said, we have created a good tech stack in terms of lead generation, in terms of fulfillment, transparent pricing, tax compliance, and we will also promote it that way.
We are quite confident that the consumer will be excited because there will be many benefits here. We hope that it contributes a decent volume for the partners who are working with us. We will have to see how it evolves. Good preparations and good plans are warranted today.
Okay. Thanks a lot. Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Rashi from Citi. Please go ahead.
Thank you. Just two questions. On the paint side, I think I missed the point that you mentioned that excluding Birla Opus, you said that the industry growth was flat, is that what you said?
If you take Q1 of FY 2025 and if I remove Birla Opus from both left-hand and right-hand side, the market growth is marginally negative.
With Birla?
With Birla, we said it's above over 5%.
What is your general estimate for the industry growth for the, I mean, I understand that a generally strong period is coming up, but on average for the year, how are you thinking about it?
I think it's too early. It's just been one quarter. There are three more quarters left. We will have to just wait and see. You know, we will play a good game.
That's what it depends.
Rashi, I think this is the fourth same question asking. Let me address it. Himanshu, I just addressed it. It's dependent on the industry players. There is volume in the market. Now, whether you want to convert that volume into value, it is now left to the industry players. That is to us what we are repeatedly saying. Okay. There's enough in the market. The market has views, opportunities. Consumers want to do painting services. They can take it and discount it and still get volume and not get value, or they can keep the value with them. That is where the current industry is. That is why we are waiting.
Is there any update on the whole CCI investigation?
Yeah. I would like to share CCI's achievements. Grasim has filed information with CCI regarding the practices found in the market with respect to the abuse of dominance by the dominant player. CCI saw merit in information and evidence shared by Grasim and has ordered DG for investigation on 1st July , 2025. The order is available for public on the website of CCI. We have to wait to see the results of the investigation. As this is a matter of sub judice and with the regulator, we will not be able to comment anything further on the investigation.
Okay. Understood. Thank you. Just last question for me. You mentioned that the B2B business was breaking in FY 2028. Is that what you said?
Very sad. When we reach this $1 billion mark, we will be at fault.
Understood. Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is from Shreya from Oaklane Capital. Please go ahead.
Yes. Thanks for the opportunity. My question is related to the chemical business. I wanted to know, you have mentioned that.
Sorry to interrupt you. You're sounding a little distant. Can you please speak a little louder and closer to the mic?
Yeah, am I audible now?
Yeah.
Yeah, it is better. Okay.
My question is related to the chemical business. You mentioned that the chlorine integration levels for the quarter were 63%. Could you give some sense or color on what portion of it was to the dedicated customers and what was for the internal consumption?
The breakup of the chlorine sales, I think the internal consumption, I will give you a range because I don't want to give you an exact number.
A range stands for any sense or directionally could help.
About 40% internal consumption.
Sorry, your voice was muffled.
About 30% - 40%, it is a range which we are giving, will be in the internal consumption. The rest goes to the pipeline customers.
Okay. Understood. Any sense on the, since we will be having our ECH plant, and as you mentioned earlier, that because of the ECH prices going higher, the epoxy margins were compressed, as and when we have our ECH plant, where do you see our epoxy margins going forward?
Wouldn't that also not depend on the ECH price at that moment in time in that quarter? As you know, ECH is a volatile commodity. We have to make an assumption on either propylene or glycine or whatever. That's a difficult one to predict. Of course, our profitability with.
Thank you, sir. Yeah, I understand.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Anirudha Joshi from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead.
Thanks. I guess on paint, you indicated a premium revenue share of premium paint is 65%. Correct number or?
Aniruddha, your voice is breaking.
It's not revenue share. Revenue contribution to the total contribution of premium plus luxury is 65%.
Okay. Understood. This premium paint is calculated, means if any price and above, like INR 200 per liter or INR 250 per liter, means how is the how do you define that?
Market defines premium and luxury products in waterproofing segment, in wood finish segment, in emulsion segment, and enamel segment. The same is the definition. It varies from each category-wise. It's very well defined. We have a brand. We have three broad brands. Tide is a brand for economy. Calista is a brand for premium. One is a brand for luxury. Primarily, when I combine Calista plus One, wherever applicable. Otherwise, whatever is market defined in a particular category. It's very well defined.
Okay. Sure, sir. Additional details, means what would be the geography-wise revenue breakup? If you can indicatively share east to west, north to south, even if you share in FY 2025, that's enough.
We have also told in the past that we are generally performing well across Pan India. We also said that the range between maybe my best-performing region and my so-called slowest-performing region is also in 50 to 120. That continues. By and large, we have good acceptance. Like you said, we are growing and consolidating across all markets. This is also changing a bit dynamically.
Our aspiration is Pan India, not regional aspiration. We want to grow and lead in every market.
Some other businesses of other competitors have focused on particular states or have very disproportionate revenue from three states. We want to be all India, all-rounder, where we are doing well across all geographies.
Okay. Sure. Last question. We keep hearing from Channel checks that the 10% extra grammage scheme is withdrawn in a market. Is that understanding correct or it's incorrect?
I'm very happy that you raised this because if you were not going to raise, I would have anyway given a clarification. We've also heard from other analysts' calls that people know more about our business than us ourselves. Let me put this record straight that the 10% offer on 20 liters and 10 liters for a majority of emulsion packs that we are giving fully continues. This puts the record straight.
Okay. Sure. Thanks. Thanks for that clarification. Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Sucrit Patil from Eyesight FinTrade. Please go ahead.
Thank you very much. My question is specifically to Mr. Himanshu. Is Mr. Himanshu online?
Yes, sir. Go ahead.
Yes, sir. This is Sucrit Patil. I had a forward-looking question on your emerging trends. Specifically, the B2B e-commerce, how is Grasim thinking about cross-platform data monetization, predictive data demand mapping, or AI-led SKU optimization across the vertical in the next two to three years? In your view, does this create a differentiated ecosystem advantage versus standalone tier? That's a thing in your view on this.
To be able to, if I was in an environment which did not have a privacy applicable to me, I would have given a very different answer. Today, the privacy laws of the country are very, very strong. Doing cross-sales from different platforms in my mind is not permitted. I am currently the Chairman of FICCI Privacy Board, and clearly, that's not permitted.
We have to go back to the customer to do cross-sale of which is of a customer available in one platform to the other platform. That in itself is a one-way start. Both the new businesses are in the process of getting their act together, and we are not going to cross this bridge for a certain period of time. That's our current position.
Thank you very much. The line for the participant dropped. The next question is from the line of Sakshi, individual investor. Please go ahead.
Hi, good evening, everyone. My question is regarding chemical business. How much is the chlorine price for this quarter?
For the quarter that we just reported, chlorine was trading at about INR 6,000 to -INR 6,500 .
While calculating ECU, are we considering flakes and hydrogen realization?
Everything that relates to the actual electrolysis process is considered in the ECU realization. That's the industry standard.
Actually, if you see some industry are calculating ECU, they are considering flakes, and some are like both flakes and hydrogen. What are we following in Grasim?
ECU stands for electrochemical unit. Every realization I get related to my electrochemical unit is in my ECU realization. I can only tell you what my definition is.
And for the extension plan, we reported like ECH is 50 and CPV is 50 KTPA , however, with chlorine derivative, we are getting 79 KTPA plan for expansion. May I know what's the difference between 100 and 79? Is it like partly already commissioned or what exactly is it?
As you know, the market conditions are a little bit uncertain right now. Certain projects on chlorine derivatives have been deferred for better market conditions. That is the difference between what we indicated last quarter and this quarter. Those are smaller chlorine derivatives. The two main ones are ECH and CPVC, and those are proceeding as planned. The rest, we may accelerate or delay based on the market conditions.
Okay. Okay. What is the plan for the extension of caustic to 25 KTPA? Is it same as quarter three financial year 2026 or what exactly is it?
That is, again, market timing dependent. It's a very small expansion. When we believe the conditions are favorable, we will execute that.
As we know, like Adani and the Reliance is coming into the picture, what we are thinking like it will impact our domestic market?
We have been getting this question a couple of times. Their project is related to PVC. There are a lot of changes also that happen in the global caustic scenario. If PVC demand adds in one area, it subsides from another area. It's a somewhat complicated question to answer. The Indian market is not insulated from the global market either on PVC or on caustic. Just looking at the picture from an India perspective only may not give us the full answer.
Thank you.
If you can just go to PVC production capacity in Asia, and then you put that in context of whatever Indian capacity is coming.
Thank you very much. Ladies and gentlemen, due to time constraints, we will take that as the last question. With this, we conclude today's conference call. On behalf of Grasim Industries Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect.