Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. I'm Vandana, the moderator for this conference. Welcome to the Indus Towers Limited fourth quarter and year ended March 31st, 2023 earnings call. For the duration of the presentation, all participant lines will be in the listen-only mode. After the presentation, the question and answer session will be conducted for all the participants on this call. In case of a natural disaster, the conference call will be terminated post an announcement. Present with us on the call today is the senior leadership team of Indus Towers, Mr. Prachur Sah, MD and CEO, Mr. Vikas Poddar, CFO, Mr. Tejinder Kalra, COO, and Mr. Dheeraj Agarwal, Head Investor Relations. Before I hand over the call, I must remind you that the overview and discussion today may include certain statements that must be viewed in conjunction with others that we state.
I now hand over the call to our first speaker of the day, Mr. Prachur Sah. Thank you. Over to you, Mr. Shah.
Thank you, Vandana, and a very warm welcome to all participants on the call. I am pleased to present our business performance for the quarter and the year ended March 31, 2023. Joining me today are my colleagues, Vikas Poddar, CFO; Mr. Tejinder Kalra, COO; Dheeraj Agarwal, Head Investor Relations. In my first full quarter at Indus, I'm delighted to see the 5G and the new tower rollouts occurring in full swing, which bodes well for the telecom space as a whole and is in line with the government's drive towards digitalization. Before I begin our agenda today, I would like to reiterate Indus Towers' commitment towards enabling pan-India connectivity, including some of the most challenging and remote locations. Our team of bravehearts installed four mobile towers in Gurez Valley in Jammu and Kashmir, which is located at an altitude of 8,460 feet.
Working in the extremely harsh weather conditions in the months of November and December, the team managed to enable connectivity across 15 villages in the valley. This demonstrates the excellence and customer focus that are part of our day-to-day execution activities. The commitment of employees reflects in the accolades we continue to win for being employer of the choice. For the 10th consecutive year, we have won the Gallup Exceptional Workplace Award, and Indus Towers is among the four global companies this year to have won this award for 10 years or more. Coming to the key themes I would like to talk about today. With regards to the industry, the government remains committed towards facilitating rapid deployment of telecom infrastructure across the country and is repeatedly taking steps to that end.
A couple of quarters back, the RoW rules were amended, allowing licensees to deploy telecom infrastructure over a private property without requiring approval from the concerned government authority. Licensees are only required to intimate the local authorities. In the quarter gone by, many states have proceeded to notify this RoW policy, which is an encouraging development. As more and more states follow suit in the future, the deployment of telecom infrastructure is bound to become easier and faster, which is crucial for the safe 5G rollout. Talking about the 5G rollout. The deployment of 5G infrastructure and rollout of 5G services have been progressing rapidly. The top two operators have launched 5G services in more than 500 cities and are planning to complete the urban coverage in India over the next three to six months.
More than 140,000 5G-based transceiver stations or BTS have been deployed across the country, with the average weekly run rate increasing from 5,000 BTS in December to 7,000 in March. At Indus Towers, we remain steadfast in our commitment towards facilitating the rollouts by the operators. We are making necessary investment in our network to support installation of 5G equipment on our existing sites. As indicated in our previous earnings call, the loading of 5G equipment has now started to add to our revenues. It should increase further. We expect the 5G opportunity to continue to build in the form of requirement of additional sites as the penetration of 5G services increases and capacity need arises. Given our leadership position and expertise in providing passive infrastructure, we stand to capitalize on the growing 5G opportunity.
The 5G adoption story continues to play out well globally as per statistics mentioned in the Ericsson Mobility Report. The pace of 5G subscription accelerated after addition of 136 million subscribers during the quarter of December 2022, compared to 110 million subscribers in the September quarter. This helped the global 5G subscriptions to cross the 1 billion mark, which are expected to reach 5 billion by the end of 2028 as per the same report. The number of commercial 5G service providers also increased from 228 in September 2022 to 235 in December 2022. The adoption of 5G services is much faster than 4G, as 5G reached 1 billion subscriptions two years sooner than 4G.
With respect to India, 5G subscriptions are expected to reach the 500 million mark by 2027, with a penetration of about 40% as per the report. The steady trend of increasing 5G adoption and upgrade from 2G to 4G stand to support the strong data consumption story playing out in the country. The total data consumed across the top three operators combined grew by 17% year-on-year in the December quarter. The average data consumed per user per month across the top three operators stood at almost 21 GB for the quarter ending December 2022, registering a year-on-year growth of 17%. This growth is underpinned by the continued migration of from 2G to 4G, given 31 million 4G data users were added, upgraded in 2022.
As per Nokia MBiT Index of 2023, data consumption per user per month is expected to grow to 46 GB by 2027. The healthy consumption, supplemented by the rapid uptake of 5G, is expected to lead to increased demand for passive telecom infrastructure, and we remain well equipped to cater to this demand. Coming to our operational performance. I'm happy to report that we had a solid quarter, wherein our tower addition, including leaner towers, was one of the highest in our history. During the quarter, we had net additions of 3,482 macro towers and 3,396 corresponding co-locations. A reduction in co-location churn, both sequentially and year-on-year, also helped the net additions.
Our total towers and co-locations at the end of Q4 were at 192,874 and 342,831 respectively, growing by 4% and 2.1% on a year-over-year basis. Our tenancy ratio dipped marginally from 1.79 to 1.78, but continues to be industry-leading. Our leaner tower additions were at 1,241 in Q4, compared to 1,408 co-locations in Q3. Including leaner towers, our net co-location additions stood at 4,637 in Q4, compared to 2,715 in Q3. Over the past few quarters, we have revisited our internal processes, with the focus on improving the time to market for our products, which has been one of our major asks from the customers.
The simplification of these processes, coupled with aggressive rollouts by the customer, has helped us deliver the substantial number of additions. Given our major customer has increased its focus on rural expansion, which is generating a good demand, especially for our micro towers, we expect the demand to remain healthy. I would also like to briefly touch upon the collection from one of our major customers. We are pleased to see progress on that front. Our collections from this customer have improved during the quarter and were close to the invoicing amount. We are constantly engaging with the customer to also clear the past outstanding amount. government's decision to convert the interest use of the said customer into equity is also a positive step and is expected to help ease the financial burden of the customer. We are closely monitoring development on the customer's fund raise plan.
Now, moving on to ESG, which is a strategic priority for the organization. We have identified key focus areas within the environment, social, and governance dimensions, and made medium to long-term commitments to work towards them. Given the scale and large energy footprint of business, GHG emissions is one of the major focus areas for us, and we have committed to net zero GHG emissions by 2050, in line with Science Based Targets initiative. We are driving multiple energy interventions with a focus on reduction in diesel consumption and expansion of renewable energy portfolio. We are constantly reducing our diesel consumption through operational efficiencies and enhancing our storage solutions. Diesel consumption decreased by about 6% year-on-year in FY 2023, despite increase in number of sites and 5G loading. Our efforts are also yielding results through quarter-on-quarter increase in non-DG sites.
We are working on building solar sites and also exploring re-renter technologies. We have recently signed an MoU to run a pilot for aluminium-air technology for generation of clean energy. Responsible handling and cycling of waste is another key area which we have identified. We are working towards 100% recycling of our hazardous waste, mainly lead and lube oil, through driving a structural change in our value chain. Having a diverse workforce and ensuring the highest safety standards are also something we are striving towards. We aspire to increase our gender diversity five times from the current levels of about 6%. A series of initiatives are being planned to improve the diversity at both field and management positions.
With respect to ensuring safety of people, especially in the field, we are using innovative ways to bring awareness and ensure compliance, which has helped us reduce our field incidents. As we continue to intensify our actions on ESG, we are also enhancing our disclosures and reporting. An increased disclosure of our non-financial performance in our last year annual report and participation in ESG rating provider survey have resulted in improvement in our MSCI rating and S&P Global Sustainability score. We are quite hopeful of our all-round efforts yielding desired results in our ESG journey, and we will keep reporting on the same. I would now request Vikas to take you through our financial performance for the quarter end, year ended March 31, 2023. I look forward to your questions. Over to you, Vikas. Thank you.
Thank you, Prachur Sah. I'm pleased to share with all of you the financial results of the fourth quarter and year-ended 31st March 2023 for Indus Towers. Before I take you through the financial performance, I would like to reiterate our robust operational performance, wherein we saw a significant uptick in our tower and co-location additions. As you heard, we added 3,482 macro towers and 3,396 corresponding co-locations in quarter four. We closed the year at a total tower and co-location count of 192,874 and 342,831 respectively, each growing at 4% and 2.1% on year-on-year basis, and 1.8% and 1% on quarter-on-quarter basis.
Addition in our lean tower portfolio remains strong at 1,241 co-locations in Q4, taking our co-location base for lean tower to 6,924. Next, I would like to take you through the financial performance for the fourth quarter. Before that, let me remind you that in the previous quarter, there was a one-off provision impact of INR 5.5 billion from deferred revenue recognition in Q4 FY22, and a negative impact of INR 22.7 billion from provision for doubtful debts in Q3 of FY23. Hence, the Q4 FY23 performance should be viewed accordingly.
Our reported gross revenue fell by 5.1% year-on-year to INR 67.5 billion, of which the core revenue from rental was down by 10.4% year-on-year to INR 42.5 billion. Adjusted for the one-off, our gross revenue and core revenue grew by 2.8% and 2.4% respectively year-on-year. Please note that the revenue for quarter four FY 2023 had an impact of non-recognition of INR 0.8 billion pertaining to revenue equalization assets for one of our major customers. On a quarter-on-quarter basis, our reported gross revenue was down by 0.2% and core revenue from rentals was up by 1.8% respectively. The growth in our core revenue from rental is reflective of the healthy tower and tenancy additions and the loading of 5G equipments.
Adjusted gross and core revenue grew by 0.1% and 2.2% respectively. Reported EBITDA was down 15.3% year-on-year and up 190.6% quarter-on-quarter to INR 34.5 billion. EBITDA margin was down 6.2 percentage points year-on-year and up 33.5 percentage points quarter-on-quarter to 51%. Adjusted for the aforesaid factors, EBITDA declined by 1.8% year-on-year and was up 0.7% quarter-on-quarter. The EBITDA had an impact of increase in reported energy losses. Energy margins were lower at -2.2% in Q4 FY23 due to the impact of certain year-end adjustments in energy billing. On a full year basis, and adjusted for one-off energy margin, was -1.8% for the year.
There is constant focus on improving this based on the initiatives, Prachur mentioned in his speech earlier. Our reported profit after tax was at INR 14 billion, compared to the loss of INR 7.1 billion in quarter three FY23, and was down 23.5% on year-on-year basis. Adjusted for the aforesaid factors of one-offs, profit after tax was down 0.8% on year-on-year basis and up 4.7% on quarter-on-quarter basis. I'll now move to the performance for full year FY23. Our gross revenues grew 2.4% year-on-year to INR 283.8 billion, and core revenue was down 1% year-on-year to INR 174.3 billion. Adjusted for one-off, gross revenue and core revenue were up 2.1% and 2% year-on-year respectively.
On a reported basis, EBITDA declined by 34.6% to INR 97.7 billion, and profit after tax was down 68% to INR 20.4 billion. Adjusted for one-offs and provisions, EBITDA and profit after tax were up by 0.5% and down 0.6% year-on-year respectively. Free cash flow for the year was INR 14 billion, which was impacted by the shortfall in collection during the year from a major customer. In the fourth quarter, our collections from the customer saw an improvement, thereby resulting in a muted impact of provisions for doubtful debts on quarter four financials. We had adopted and continue to follow a stringent ECL computation and accordingly carry a provision for doubtful debts of INR 54.5 billion relating to the said customer to de-risk our balance sheet.
We continue to be in active discussions with the customer to improve the collections further to address the past outstanding and are committed to protect the interest of the shareholders. Our reported pre-tax return on capital employed and post-tax return on equity for the past 12 months were at 11% and 9.4% respectively. The return ratios have been impacted by the provision for doubtful debts and impairment of revenue equalization assets during the year. In summary, we are pleased with the operational performance we delivered during the quarter, and it's a testament to our strengths and as a leading player in the tower co space. Our financial performance reflects both our strong operating numbers and improved collection. Our customers' focus on expanding its coverage in rural market and the ongoing fast-paced 5G rollout make us optimistic about the demand outlook in the near to medium term.
With this, I would now request the moderator to open the floor for question and answers, please. Thank you.
Thank you very much, sir. We will now begin the question and answer interactive session for all the participants who are connected to the audio conference service from Airtel. Due to time constraint, we would request if you could limit the number of questions to two to enable more participation. Hence, management will take only two questions per participant to ensure maximum participation. Participants who wish to ask questions may please press star one on their touch-tone enabled telephone keypad. On pressing star one, participants will get a chance to present their question on a first-in-line basis. To ask a question, participant may please press star one now. The first question comes from Mr. Sanjesh from ICICI Securities, Mumbai. Mr. Sanjesh, you may ask your question now.
Yes. Good afternoon, and thanks for taking my questions. First on the 5G rollout and loading revenue. Can you give us some direction what is the loading revenue as a % of rentals we get on the 5G, and how much can it really drive in terms of ARPT growth say over next three years because this is where we should be banking most for our growth over next three years, next two to three years? Considering that the weight of the equipment from the 5G has now significantly come down from 40 kilos to now what, 18 odd kilos, the opportunity on the loading radios, is it a right assessment?
Thanks for the question, Sanjesh. I'll take the first question, and then I will let maybe Tejinder take the second part of the question. In terms of the loading revenue, I think we shared earlier that the 5G loading revenue drives roughly anywhere between 5%-10% growth in the ARPT, depending on which towers we are rolling out and who is rolling out. Because in case of 5G rollout in the two bands, the loading is a bit higher than rolling out 5G on a single band. Anywhere between 5%-10% is the sort of growth that we see because of the 5G loading.
Okay.
Sanjesh, just to answer your question on the second portion that, yes, the weight of the radios on the towers, in case of 5G has come down. Yes. 18 to 20 kilos, depending upon which is the vendor for the equipment. From a tower loading perspective, we are fairly covered. I don't think we'll have any issue in terms of accommodating our customers' 5G equipment on our sites. This actually helps us in terms of any additional loading also that may come up. We are, we are quite secured from that perspective.
The second question is on the 5G rollout. India is a bright spot, probably there. Apart from India, if you look at what Ericsson and Nokia earnings forecast, it doesn't look like that the world is really sharing this 5G rollout at such an accelerated pace. Do we see any risk of India also probably, say, six-eight months down the line, significantly slow down the 5G CapEx, similar to what we have seen in the other part of the world? I understand it's a five-year, eight-year opportunity that there is a significant data need to be carried, and 5G is very important. I'm talking from more near term, like one or two years. Can we see a more gradual rollout on 5G than the accelerated pace which we are seeing? Just one clarification, Dev.
In the opening remarks, we talked about 5,000 sites going to 7,000 sites in terms of tower. This we are talking about the number of towers, right, on which 5G is getting rolled out. That's the clarification. Thank you.
No, I think, that's more of BTS, number overall. The 5G, we talked about the 5,000-7,000 BTS.
It's a BTS number, right?
Yeah, it's a BTS number. Yes.
You got it. Okay.
We have rolled out.
The weekly run rate. The weekly run rate from 5,000 BTS in December to 7,000 in March. That's the weekly run rate that we saw in March, 7,000 in March.
Oh, this is weekly run rate.
Yes, yes.
Oh.
The operators are significantly scaling up the 5G rollout. Just to give you a sense on, you know, while you raised the concern on this, you know, the data offtake happening and with 5G giving much higher, you know, data capacities. I think the rate at which data consumption is growing in India and globally, we don't see, at least this our expectation. I'm sure the operator can answer this better. We don't see the rollout slowing down at any given point in time. I mean, if you look at the Ericsson, Nokia projections as well, from a 21 GB per subscriber per month consumption, they are projecting to this to go up to about 47 GB, which essentially means more than doubling in the next two to three years timeframe.
Given that 5G actually the cost per MB of data in 5G is significantly lower compared to a 4G or other technologies. I think the operators will have all the incentive to roll out full 5G more if they have to feed that kind of a data demand. We don't see that risk for now at the moment at least, neither in the next couple of years.
Got it. Got it. Fair enough. Thanks for answering those questions and best regards for the coming quarter.
Thank you very much, Mr. Sanjesh. The next question comes from Mr. Kunal Vora from BNP Paribas, Mumbai. Mr. Vora, please go ahead with your question now.
Hi. Thanks for the opportunity. My first question is on the progress for collecting the current dues from Vodafone Idea. How are you thinking about the past dues now? Do you think it makes sense to continue the service till the time they keep clearing their current dues, or do you think collection of past due is a must in coming quarter also?
Kunal, I think, it's You know, if you look at what has happened in the quarter, right? There have been some positive developments. The government decided to convert the interest, you know, into, you know, into equity. That's a positive development. Given the fact that we made collections, I think we are closely watching the situation and engaging with the customer to make sure first that our debts don't decrease, and we can expedite the collection of the, you know, past receivables. I think, you know, while there has been some positive developments, I think we will have to monitor the situation.
I, you know, I can't tell you exactly when this is going to happen, but we believe these positive developments does, you know, reinforce that there is a possibility that this may happen, and we'll be making sure that we do as much collections as possible for us. Right. As of now, that's the plan. That's the plan I can share with you.
Yes. For now, try to assume that as long as the current dues are getting collected, it's fine. I mean, like, while you will keep pushing the customer, but, for now, if current dues keep getting collected, you're okay.
Yeah, sure. Yeah.
Yeah. Okay. Second is, you saw strong tower additions, in fourth quarter. What would be the ROI you'll be making in these towers, assuming they remain single tenants? Is CapEx and rental on these towers similar to the older towers or there is any difference in the terms?
Let me answer the second part first, then I'll ask Vikas to comment on the ROI. See, over the period of time, I think there has been considerable improvement in the CapEx per tower, right? I think, what used to be the CapEx per tower, five, 10 years ago compared to what it is now, it's a much lower CapEx. From a CapEx profile, it has changed. Vikas, you want to add something on the ROI side?
Kunal, on your ROI question, I think, first of all, there are obviously a lot of variants of towers that we do, and each variant has a different investment profile and different return profile and so on. At a broad level, if I were to sort of give you a sense, I would say at single tenancy, first of all, the return profile is not negative. It's a positive return that we generate. And depending on whether it is a GBT or a eco site, you know, these are different variants. It could range between, let's say, a single, high single digit to a low double digit sort of thing at single tenancy profile. It's all positive.
We have signed up beyond that.
Yeah.
It should be double digits, right? To cover the cost of capital.
Usually these are very long-term assets. Over the life of the asset, we obviously see loading coming in, and we also see the tenancy build up and so on. Obviously the return profile is never constant. As the loading increases, as the usage increases, the return profile also improves over the life of the asset.
Understood. Understood. Just one last question. Your thoughts on dividends going forward?
Vikas, you want to comment on dividends?
Well, on the dividends, as you can see, we have not announced. Obviously, as per our policy, the dividend continues to be linked to the free cash flow. During the year, we have generated INR 14 billion of free cash flow, as you would have seen in the result. However, we, in this decision, we are also sort of supposed to consider the working capital requirement of the company. We are tracking the development on the receivables and working capital very closely. We, we'll continue to review the situation time to time and take a decision on the dividend distribution in the coming period as we progress. As of now, I think, we basically need to watch a few more quarters and be comfortable on the cash.
Why not distribute the free cash flow which you did generate this year?
Like I said, I mean, somewhere, there is, in the working capital evaluation, a bit of a stress that we see. And, we need to really see the free cash flow generation for some more quarters to be able to sort of be comfortable with the working capital situation. Most of the working capital for the year was generated towards the second half. We were struggling in the first half because of the receivables situations and the lower collections and so on. I think, one or two quarters probably is, you know, is a very short timeframe. We really need to be confident, for some more quarters.
Okay. Okay. Okay. That's it from me. Thank you very much.
Thank you very much, Mr. Vora. The next question comes from Mr. Mitul Shah from Reliance Securities, Mumbai. Mr. Shah, you may ask your question now.
Thank you for the opportunity, sir. First, verification on collections from Vi. That can we safely assume that during January, February, March, this current quarter, we collected a sizable or nearly say 90%-100% of the current collection?
Mitul, I think, certainly we have seen improvement versus what we were collecting in the past. Yeah, I think, pretty much we are in the range of 90%-100% collection in this quarter. Yeah, I mean, it's been a good quarter for us as far as collection is concerned.
Just want to then, again confirm that this INR 4,900 crore kind of receivable. Again, major portion will be from this, client, and this pertains to entirely historical period, right?
No. Receivables, of course, we have, more than one customer. The receivables represent the outstanding that we have from all our customers. Unfortunately, we cannot disclose the specific numbers for our customers.
Yes, sir. Great. I understand. My point is that in past when situation were normal, roughly we used to have INR 300 crore-INR 500 crore kind of a receivable at the end of year. Now it has reached to INR 4,900 crore. That means nearly 85%-90% receivable, seems to be from this major maybe, near that about those range. That pertains to past period. That's what I want to just confirm.
There is certainly past period receivables sitting in this number. I don't think we have ever had INR 300 crores of receivables. I mean, usually, we have a certain credit period with our customers, and our receivables are sort of representing those outstandings net of provisions. We have basically the batted provisions of almost INR 54 billion, which is netted off in that number.
Okay. Sir, last question on this leaner tower related revenue. Is this because of that, right, we are not factoring that into the number of towers? Our revenue per tower is slightly increased on a QOQ basis.
Sorry, could you repeat that question, Mitul?
In our reporting number of towers, we are not calculating leaner tower, right? All these are macro towers.
Yes, that's right.
Our revenues are increasing from the leaner tower also. Is that a key reason, one of the reasons, major reason for the QOQ improvement in revenue per tower?
No. when it comes to the revenue per tower metric, they are representing the macro segment only. While we are rolling out leaner towers, but the number of leaner towers as well as the revenue from those towers are not very material at the moment to be reported as a separate segment. The KPI represents the revenue per tower for macro segment only.
Okay, sir. Thanks.
Thank you very much, Mr. Shah. Participants who wish to ask questions may please press star one on their custom enable telephone keypad. The next question comes from Mr. Arun Prasath from Spark Capital, Chennai. Mr. Prasath, you may ask your question now.
Thank you, for the opportunity. Apologies if I, if a question is repeated. I joined late. This CapEx per tower in this year seems to be at least 20% higher than the previous year. Any specific reason for this, sir?
CapEx per tower? I mean, No, Arun, I mean, there is, in fact, from last year in terms of the metal prices and all, we have seen softening. I don't know really which number you are picking up and where you have picked this up from.
How I'm doing is I'm taking total CapEx, and then removing the maintenance CapEx.
Okay.
On the remaining growth CapEx, I'm just dividing by the number of additional towers.
Yeah.
I get the number around close to INR 4.5 million in this year as compared to INR 2.5 million last year. Highest.
No. You need to bear in mind that, you know, it's not a homogeneous tower that we know about. I mean, we have many variants in our towers, so there is always a mixed effect of whether we are doing rooftop or ground-based or macro or lean or so on. Depending on the mix, the averages could vary.
Okay. I think to be, I mean, under the interest we are doing some expensive GDN-based towers or GDN towers. This 25% increase on a decreasing, inflationary, disflationary seems to be hard.
Arun, I think some of this CapEx is also related to the upgrade CapEx that is being spent on the, you know. I don't know how you've calculated it, this must be including 5G rollouts and the upgrades as well. I don't think it's purely a tower on tower. What we can confidently say is that the tower cost per tower is not increasing. In fact, we can see an improvement in the per cost CapEx. I think the number needs to be looked in holistic point of view in terms of how many 5G rollouts have been done, how many sharings have been added, and how many new sites have been added. I think there is a mix to play here, which may be giving you an impression like that.
Because, you know, last year there was no 5G rollout. This year there was significant 5G rollout. That must be sitting in the CapEx as well that you're probably not factoring in. Yeah.
Okay. Of course. Yeah. Of course, true. I mean, answer to earlier part is when you said there's 20 kg of additional loading from the 5G distributions. I thought that, before that I thought that could be the reason, anyway, I will take your offline. My second question is on the free cash flow generation, you're not able to pay dividend this year. I just, shouldn't we be taking a pause in our growth CapEx so that we, you know, have some comfortable position to paying out to the shareholders? Until we get, say, compensation higher when we are rolling out for a single tenant. What is the urgency for doing CapEx at this phase, especially given the bleak outlook from the second tenant?
Obviously at this point of time, it looks like gaining market share of the tower business seems to be counterintuitive. Have you considered that option? What is your thought process behind this?
To be honest, Arun, I mean, if I understood correctly, you're saying is that why do the CapEx now? I think, from my point of view, what I can say is, I mean, being in a rented business, if you don't make it now, you probably never make it, right? I think it's an important year for growth, so we have to capture it. On the dividend part, Vikas already mentioned, I think we are currently evaluating the situation. I think, in the coming quarters, we'll be continuing to evaluate based on how the funding situation of the customer changes, and we'll keep reviewing the dividend part. I think from a CapEx point of view, we remain, you know, committed to the growth because this is something that's gonna keep with us for a very long time.
Vikas, if you could add something.
I think that's it. Certainly, I mean, it's a growth opportunity that we have, and I don't think we should really let the opportunity go because we are going to, with this growth in towers, we are going to generate cash flows for the next 10 years, which is very important. Yeah. I hope that answers your question, Arun.
No. I... To an extent, I understand. What I think is, what I'm trying to understand is, does our MSA allows to charge incrementally over and above what it is, so that you get compensated in... Given that the current situation doesn't allow you to monetize. The tower company or all the tower companies hope that eventually a second tenant will come. Given that the uncertainty into there, is there anything that we are really able to charge to the customer? Especially now given that the one of the last customer is also a shareholder, so there is obviously a conflict of interest. Is there any structure in place to manage these?
These are all the top of the mind questions that I'm trying to understand.
Arun, to be honest, I think, I think you're asking, quite a few questions in one question. I'll try to simplify. I think as we were answering the earlier part of the question, I think the overall profile of the, even the single tenant towers have changed in terms of both what we are doing with the CapEx, in terms of the return profile and what loading we expect on those towers in the coming years, right? Even if at the risk of, you know, single tenant, as, 5G rollouts happen and the building occurs and with the base profile that we have, we believe it's not the right time to miss this opportunity. Of course, if the other customer comes along, it further improves the margin, right? That's what, our approach is.
We are looking at many opportunities internally in terms of operational efficiency further, how we can improve our operating reduce our operating cost and improve the overall profitability for our company.
All good. All good. Thank you. I'll get back to you. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Sarathy. The next question comes from Mr. Nitin Deshpande from Axis Bank Limited. Mr. Deshpande, you may ask your question now.
Yeah. Good afternoon. Thanks for giving me the opportunity.
My first question was on your energy margins. In the opening remarks, you have mentioned that margins are negative due to your adjustments. What is your outlook on energy margins for the FY 2024? The other was, the second question was, total energy cost which is there, how much is a common energy cost and how much is operator-specific energy cost?
Let me answer the first one. The second part I actually didn't understand the question but on the outlook for FY 2024, as you have already said, there are certain initiatives that we are currently working on to improve our overall profile of the energy operations for the energy cost. Our outlook is energy margin in FY 2024 is going to look better this year. We have to take data and targets to make sure that that improvement is seen. I believe the outlook remains. The energy margin will improve in the right direction in FY 2024.
The second question which you asked, I probably didn't understand is, I mean, most of the energy cost is on a tower and with an operator, so I didn't understand what you mean by common cost.
Yeah. Nitin, just I hope I have understood your question correctly. Typically if you have an indoor site, the cost of running AC is on those sites, which is obviously a common cost between multiple or as many tenants that you have on the site, which is the only cost which is, you know, kind of common. Otherwise the cost of energy is dependent upon the load that the operator is running for their particular equipment at our site, and that consumption drives the energy cost for that operator.
Okay. The common energy cost inside that, what percentage it would be of the total cost of the?
Depends upon the profile of the site. If it is an indoor site, typically 15, 20%, 25%. It is also getting paid by the operator. Obviously that common cost is being billed to the customer as well because it is required to run their equipment.
Okay. That's all from my side. Thank you.
Thank you very much, Mr. Deshpande. The next question comes from Mr. Vivekanand S from Ambit Private Limited, Mumbai. Mr. Vivekanand, you may ask your question now.
Hi, thank you so much for the opportunity. Could you give us an update on potential consolidation that could happen in the tower space? There are media reports that one of your competitors is perhaps looking to exit, and there is obviously distress and misery caused by this big operator all across the sector. Thank you.
Vivek, it's, you know, for us it's very difficult to speculate or comment on the media reports per se as such. I think we'll keep looking at what happens, right. Our objective still remains to be the market leader and get the market share, whatever comes out in due course. That's where our focus remains. For the media report that you're mentioning, let's see, because we don't have any, to be honest, any view on that right now.
Sure. As far as the update, I missed little bit of the initial part of the commentary. I just wanna understand from the perspective of say these new modular structures that are being built, right? Lean sites and small cells. Are there consolidation opportunities outside of macro towers also for market leaders and large players like yourselves? If you could comment on, you know, how you could scale up these potential adjacent revenue opportunities.
I think you're talking about the scale-up of deploying more lean sites. I think, you know, for sure. I think that's something that we are, you know, driving and you will see more and more coming in the next few quarters.
Vivek, I think I need to understand, if you can elaborate the first part of your question a little bit. I think it's a little unclear as to what.
Sure. My understanding is that macro towers, there are only a handful of that are in that business. Perhaps in the case of small cells or lean towers, perhaps there are more number of players, perhaps smaller players also in the market. Is it possible for you to scale it, scale up these businesses more aggressively through M&A, or is it something that you will just look to build organically?
See all kinds of opportunities, of course. We are, first of all, at our end, constantly upscaling the numbers that we roll out every quarter. Of course, we don't do proactive builds depending upon the operator demand. If there is any variation one sees in a quarter, it is purely because of the demand driven from the customer side. If one were to say, you know, can we scale up inorganically, all opportunities we keep on a mix. Depending upon, you know, the evaluation outcome, we will take the decision that is appropriate.
Vivek, in general, we are quite cost competitive in that space as well. Unless there is a compelling reason, I think, I strongly believe that we should be able to scale up and compete well in that space given our efficiency what we offer the customers is beyond the construction of the tower. Our O&M and our uptime is industry-leading. What the value we offer is not just in the construction of it, but the post construction and delivering better uptime to our customers. I think we remain confident that we have a very strong portfolio in terms of both delivering the towers and then actually doing the O&M of it. Unless there is a compelling reason to do that, I think our first focus remains to get the market share answers.
Understood. Last question is, have you and Vodafone Idea, or agreed upon a payment plan for fiscal 2024? If this has been discussed in the call before then please, you know, avoid answering. I'll look up the transcript. Thank you.
There was a payment plan that was agreed, which we shared, almost two quarters back. While there are some challenges in meeting that payment plan, but we are still working with the customer to sort of sort those issues out, and basically follow on the payment plan. There's no fresh payment plan that we have agreed for FY 2024. Pretty much we are working on the, on the same plan.
Okay. Thank you so much, and all the best.
Thank you.