Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to the Matrimony.com Q1 FY 2026 Earnings Conference Call hosted by ICICI Securities. As a reminder, all participant lines will remain 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 the conference call, please signal the operator by pressing star then zero on your touch-tone telephone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I will now hand the conference over to Mr. Jayaram Shetty from ICICI Securities for opening remarks. Thank you, and over to you.
Good afternoon, everyone. On behalf of ICI Securities, I would like to welcome you all to the Quarter 1 FY 2026 Earnings Call of Matrimony.com . From the company, we have Mr. Murugavel Janakiraman, Managing Director and CEO, and Mr. Harigovind Krishnasamy, Chief Financial Officer. The call will begin with brief management remarks followed by the Q&A section. I would now like to hand over the call to Mr. Janakiraman for his opening remarks. Over to you, sir.
Thank you, Mr. Jayaram Shetty. Good evening, everyone. As mentioned in our last calls, our growth momentum picked up in Quater 1 compared to Quater 4 . With the various initiatives and strategies, we are highly confident of continuous growth in the coming quarters. For the full year, we believe we are on the track to achieve double-digit growth in year-on-year billing. In Quater 1 , on a consolidated basis, we achieved billing of INR 126.2 crore, a growth of 10% compared to the previous quarter, and 7.4% year-on-year. Revenue is at INR 115.3 crore , a growth of 6.5% over the previous quarter, and return of 4.4% year-on-year. This was due to the revenue-to-billing ratio gap. Periods for the matchmaking between Q1 are as follows: Billing at INR 125.3 crore , a growth of 10.4% over the previous quarter, and 7.8% year-on-year.
Revenue at INR 114.1 crore, a growth of 6.6% over the previous quarter, and a decline of 3.8% year-on-year. We added INR 2.62 lakh paid subscriptions in the quarter, a growth of 6.9% over the previous quarter, and a decline of 0.8% year-on-year. The average transaction value for the matchmaking business grew by 3.3% compared to the previous quarter, and 8.6% year-on-year basis. We have facilitated over 20,000 successful marriages through our matchmaking platform. Now, coming to the marriage services business, billing here reached INR 88 lakh, a decline of 28.1% over the previous quarter, and 26.3% year-on-year. Revenue was INR 1.3 crore, a decline of 4.4% over the previous quarter, and 35.8% year-on-year. EBITDA level loss for the quarter was INR 3.3 crore as compared to the loss of INR 2.2 crore in Quarter 1 of FY 2025.
This is not only marriage services, it also includes other services of the revenue we give you also. On the billing and revenue outlook for Quarter 2, the matchmaking business on a year-on-year basis expects to post either a double-digit or a single-digit growth in Quarter 2, but a decline compared to Quarter 1 as Q2 is a seasonal quarter. Marriage services and the other things, other services expect to be higher than Quarter 1. Let me hand over to Harigovind the CFO to comment on the CFO's slide.
Thanks, Murugavel. Our EBITDA margin for the matchmaking business in Q1 is at 17.6% as compared to 17.7% in Q4 and at 22.6% a year ago. The drop in EBITDA margin is largely due to a temporary drop in revenue-to-billing ratio, which will flow to P&L in the subsequent quarter. Marketing expenses for the matchmaking business in Q1 were INR 46.7 crore, broadly flat compared to Q4, and INR 47.1 crore a year ago. Excluding marketing expenses, margins for the matchmaking business grew at 59% versus 61% in Q4 and 62% a year earlier. On a consolidated basis, EBITDA margin in Q1 is at 11% compared to 10.8% in Q4 and 16.7% a year ago. Tax rate for the quarter stands at 22.5%. Tax is at INR 88.4 crore, a growth of 2.6% on a quarter-to-quarter basis, but a decline of 40% year-on-year.
Share of loss from Astro Vision, our associate company, is INR 1.9 lakhs. Cash balance at the end of Q1 is INR 330 crore. Return on capital employed is 9.1%. On the outlook for Q2 margin, we expect CAC to be at similar levels as Q1. I would like to end with the customary safe harbor statement. Certain statements during this call could be forward-looking statements on our business. These involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause the actual results to differ materially from such forward-looking statements. We do not undertake to update any such forward-looking statements that may be made from time to time by or on behalf of the company unless it is required by law.
Thank you, Harigovind. I know we can open up for questions .
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we will now begin 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 their handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. Ladies and gentlemen, a reminder, if you wish to ask a question, please press star and one. The first question comes from the line of Prema Lal, an individual investor. Please go ahead.
Hi, sir. Good evening. I'm from Hyderabad, sir.
Yes, Prema Lal, please go ahead.
Yeah. Every year, we've been that your advertisement cost should be INR 180 crore -INR 185 crore. You are spending right in the sales of 40% of the revenue. If you could reduce that advertisement, it will impact any business. That is the one question, sir. If you can reduce that advertisement cost, profitability will increase, no? That is the one question, sir. You are having INR 320 crore cash on that. You are looking in new verticals because in the market, I am not quoting any company name. You will recall one client, they are quoting a market cap 1 1,000 cr, but anyone can replicate easily. Our niche matrimony is, and it cannot replicate anyone, right? Are you looking for new verticals and all? That's two questions, sir, my side.
Okay. Regarding the first question, in terms of are you ready for marketing spend with the profit increase, yes, definitely. We continue to evaluate the opportunity to optimize the marketing spend, and we are able to do that. In fact, we are able to allocate some of the marketing tools and newer initiatives. While the marketing will overall remain at the general level, within the matchmaking, there is a shift in the marketing spend in our offering. We have started investing in EliteMatrimony.com, which was not the case a year before. While the overall marketing at this level, we expect to remain at this level for the coming quarters, we are reducing some of the offering, while also stepping up the marketing in some of those areas. There is an opportunity to reduce marketing.
It depends on whether we are able to optimize or it depends on the market scenario, which will definitely be it. At this point in time, the outlook on the marketing spend will remain at a similar level. We'll come to the other one in terms of whether we are looking at any opportunity to invest. We are investing in one of the areas of ManyJobs the POC subsidiary job in Tamil Nadu. We expect to get monetized from this quarter onwards. That's something we're already investing in, one of the areas within the matchmaking. Within matchmaking, there are initiatives as well. There is Luv.com. We got lots of new products in the year of Q3, which we believe will be the right product segment which we are looking at targeting. We continue to evaluate within the subsidiary revenue services. We are figuring out new things.
We should continue to evaluate. Thank you so much. I hope that answers my questions.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to ask a question, please press star and one. We take the next question from the line of Jayaram Shetty from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead.
Yes, yes. Please go ahead.
One of your competitors has its billing revenue grown around 36% while our billing has grown only 10.4%. What factor explains this? Is it primarily because of location? They are north-based and we are south-focused? Is that the reason or any other reason you want to point out?
See, the thing is that, you know, I think the same factor the company you're talking about, one part of the revenue has been grown by 30%. That's the change in the business model. If you change the business model when the revenue drops to 30%, when you change the business model to the earlier model, the revenue bounces back to the same opportunity. That's largely the thing. Apart from that, in a small base, there could be opportunities if you make some improvements. There can be an uptake also. It's difficult to, you know, it's not about the business where we're running at the similar stage for many years. There is a change in the business model, and the business model will also change for the players I'm asking about. The matrimonial case is nothing like changing the business model.
It continues to operate at the similar business model while integrating new businesses. The reason it's already explained was the last year was a big growth. Now, when we started growing, I think the profits are back and our strategies are going to be different. We expect the growth to continue, you know, at the right single-digit or double-digit growth. We were confident of double-digit growth until this year. The gap really changes across quarter to quarter. I think I would say that it's actually the way the change of the business model and the once again gone back to the earlier model was one of the main factors that sort of mediating the growth and all this. There may be a ramp-up in things also. It's between 10% and 5% also the difference. We continue to do whatever best we can do, that's it.
Okay. Thank you, sir. Please share an update on the mean in case we have undertaken like the Astro and ManyJobs platform. How much traction they are getting? Can you share some details on that?
ManyJobs is doing well in terms of the number of downloads and registrations. We are in Tamil Nadu, we are at a million downloads a year. We have more than INR 5 lakhs registrations because around 10,000 people are using it. At this point in time it was free, and we wanted to monetize from the quarter onwards. Probably in the coming quarters or year, you know, we know that that is done. In terms of rating, it's a better rating and serving the right customer segment. I think it's too early because, you know, any new internet business will take many years before you see whether the business is succeeding. I would say that still it's a very, very early stage, but I believe we seem to be on the right track.
The other thing, the astrology is still in the, you know, we're trying to figure out what's the best business model. We are trying to do some bit of AI astrology services, and a combination of AI plus a human astrology. That's the thing we're trying to figure out. We say that astrology we're trying to get the product market fit right. We are experimenting with that.
Thank you for your answers. This is my last question. Are you planning to do any buyback or issuing in dividends?
Buybacks, we're going to do buybacks, and the board will continue to evaluate. We are still in the, you know, normally in every buyback there's a one-year gap. I think after one year, the board may evaluate this opportunity, and the board will report.
Thank you, Mr. Janakiraman
Thank you, Mr. Jayaram, for sure.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Dhamodaran from Acutus Capital. Please go ahead.
Thank you for the opportunity. While your billing growth was around 78%, if I look at subscribers, which is around INR 2.5 lakhs, that's been broadly in the same range for three years now. What's the outlook there? I mean, is it that we have saturated on our key markets? Is that the thing? Why is that not going? Just one question on that. Related on the ATV, most of the growth is, most of the billing growth is led by ATV. Have you increased price, or is it just because of increasing share of assisted MLAs?
There's a combination. Yeah, definitely, there is a personal. Services are also doing well. Also, there's the mixer packages as well. While the growth is definitely, you know, compared to the previous quarter, there's an increase in the billing volume compared to the previous quarter. While year-on-year, they look the same, there's an increase because of the partner services and also the one-year package. All these things are contributing to increasing the average transaction value. In terms of the billing growth, yes, the billing growth is more compared to the previous quarter. In terms of gap, there's a gap, again, because of the mix of the packages. We continue to take various initiatives to drive everything, whether the average transaction value or also in terms of the number of paid subscriptions, we continue to drive. We do the combination of both the factors.
One is that the number of paid transactions in ATV. Both the factors put together will also set you the double-digit billing.
Sure. I mean, on non-profiles, are you seeing growth in profiles now that we previously from last year?
Yeah, definitely. The profile growth is happening. I'll also add one point here. Basically, because of last year, the deep growth has happened for a year. While the profile growth is back, we are also seeing the growth in the press volume. The renewal volume is here too, so you know it too catch up. It may take a couple of quarters for renewal volume to catch up. Today we're talking about the volume. It's mainly coming from the increase in the volume coming from the customer payment. It will take a couple of quarters for the renewal volume to catch up. One of the volume limit issues is in spite of the deep growth in the renewal on account of last year's deep growth. While the first-time volume is moving up, network overall volume remains intact.
Though there's a drop in the renewal volume, it's compensated by the increase in the first-time volume. The good thing is that the profile growth is there. The first-time volumes are moved up. The renewal volume will take a couple of quarters to catch up. When that happens, then the growth will, you know, the renewal volume will also contribute to the growth. That's the reason we've seen the double-digit growth, and for a year, of the coming that happened from this year. We expect that also to continue for the after that also. Apart from driving the average transaction value in terms of the growth in the partner services and other initiatives also hitting the growth. It is basically now in the volume. Instead of the drop in renewal volume, we're able to have the volume of INR 2.6 lakhs compared to the previous year. We're able to achieve it.
Sure. That is helpful. On parallelizing, I just wanted to check how the competitive intensity is across the region. Has it changed or is it broadly similar to what it was last year? You also mentioned that you are recalibrating in terms of the overall spend remaining the same. You have tweaked internally the amount of spend that you are allocating for different segments. Could you throw some light on what the changes have been from your end and what you're seeing in the market?
We definitely see there is some relation in some markets. However, the increase in some markets depends on the competitor, their business objectives. While there is some drop, it's still at a level which is more than we believe what is required. It's a very small market to market. With other things and opportunities that are still cost, we also have seen that investing within the initiatives like EliteMatrimony and other initiatives also.
Sure. Just one last question on your employee spend. If you look at your employee cost, I think you've rationalized here in terms of over the years. For the last five, six years, I think you've rationalized your headcount as well. Now it's top around 2,700 employees. Earlier, it used to be more than 4,000. Is that largely done, or is there more scope for efficiency gains from this line item? Additionally, one more observation was, you do mention attrition rates in your annual reports. That has broadly slightly come down, but overall, it seems fairly high. I understand that this is largely led by the frontline staff, which is, in this industry, that's the norm that you have around 90% , 100% turnover. Is there any scope of reduction there? I just wanted your thoughts here.
No, definitely. While definitely there's scope to reduce, not leveraging AI, which you continue to look at, you know, to optimize wherever it's possible. At the same time, with the investment behind the growth initiatives as well, also the growth in the partner services, that means we have to add a relationship manager or the growth in some initiative you have to add people. While we continue to do both, leverage the AI or drive process improvement to drive the efficiency. At the same time, where the growth is happening, where you have to add associates, we do that. That's on the paper count, headcount.
When it comes to the attrition, definitely the attrition between the organizations is coming down because we are taking various initiatives to drive that, in terms of engagement, plus also making associates to succeed and perform so that when the, because most of the attrition, you may know that is happening within the first three months or six months. We are looking at various initiatives. We definitely see that some of the initiatives are leading the ship, but again, we have more initiative in the pipeline. We are introducing some of the initiatives. We believe that that can further reduce the attrition. Probably next year, we'll see that the attrition is further going down on account of some other initiatives. We believe that it's helpful to, you know, ensure the associates are contributing at the same time engaged better so that the attrition level is coming down.
Sure. Thanks. That's all from my side. Thank you, sir.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to ask a question, please press star and one. We take the next question from the line of Prema Lal, an investor. Please go ahead.
Sir, our competitors also advertise and spend the same kind of percentage. Instead of buyback, spending in new verticals is the best way. I guess that's my view.
Yeah, sure. We don't have the full information about that because the marketing spend has two components. One is the digital marketing spend, and there's also TV marketing spend. TV is something we need to monitor. We can know what's happening across the market, but it may be difficult to understand the digital spend because that's something we wouldn't know about. We don't know what is the exact percentage compared to the listed company. The board is deciding on buybacks and other things. That's the part of it that is important to touch at the proper stage.
Thank you. Thank you.
Yeah, yeah.
Thank you. We take the next question from the line of Vasudevan, an individual investor. Please go ahead.
Hello, gentlemen. Good evening, sir.
Good evening, Mr. Vasudevan.
Hi, I think the company is AGM today. There is no big target or ambition set for you for the next five years, sir. There is one more thing. Your top line and the bottom line have been muted for the last five years. It has not shown any great deal of improvement, which is rather static. Why don't you set some big goals which will drive the team, sir? One more aspect. What is the update on your business, sir? Astrology is an area with huge potential, sir. I think we have not capitalized on that. Your view, sir? Thank you.
Thank you, Mr. Vasudevan. In terms of looking at the current billing rate, it's a maximum salary around INR 500 crore billing rate. It's not flat, and the growth was a little muted, but it's not flat. This year, the maximum salary we are looking at from the current run rate, it's INR 500 crore the run rate. While definitely we have the ambitious plan, five-year plan, obviously that we are not talking publicly or, you know, that's definitely the ambitious plan. We come to the other one in terms of the initiatives. There are new initiatives. There are ManyJobs. There are wedding services also. We are trying some initiatives. It's not famous one to all. We are working on some interesting initiatives there, and we have some traction in Tamil Nadu. Again, still too early to comment on that one. ManyJobs is in growth.
We are able to monetize some big quarters in Tamil Nadu. It's another growth. In terms of, yeah, these are the initiatives. In terms of astrology, astrology is in early context stage. Again, we are trying certain things. It's still too early. We are trying to appreciate that we are trying to build on AI plus human combination. It's a very, very early stage. We want to figure it out whether we're able to make this model successful. We are working on it, and probably in the maybe coming quarters, we'll have some better updates.
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Abhishek Banerjee from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead.
Hi, Janakiraman. My first question is with regards to the competition in the space, right? What would be your sense in terms of the market share and how has it moved over the last one year? If you could give us some sense there, that would be really helpful.
Since we don't have the publicly available information of all the players, it's difficult to comment on how the market share has moved up. We can only draw back what the information available publicly a couple of years ago. Definitely, we have more than 50% market share. I don't know whether 55% or whatever. I don't know the exact number. Now, what is standard? Because we don't know any publicly available information of all the players.
Let's say.
Hello?
Abhishek, are you there? Ladies and gentlemen, we have lost the line of the participant. We'll move on to the next question. Before that, ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to ask a question, please press star and one. We take the next question from the line of Abhishek Banerjee from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead.
Hi, sorry, I dropped off from the line. I'm just trying to understand that, you know, given matchmaking has been growing at a much faster pace as we're from a lower base, right? That would imply that our market share would have come down. Do you still think we are above 50% at least in India?
No, absolutely. I'm just sharing that, you know, since we are quarterly. A few years ago, matchmaking had a big growth of 30% because it changed the business model. Once again, they reverted back to the earlier model. Obviously, they are doing some stuff and they're still getting the growth and all. I think when I was thinking about it because I've dropped in the base and once again they're going back on the earlier model. That's also obviously they are trying whatever initiatives with a lower base and say they have that kind of growth. That's my response to that. I think that now last year was a challenge. This year, things are coming back. I believe we're able to achieve the growth. In spite of the renewal volume is up, when that happens, the growth will be further better.
That's why we feel that in the coming quarter, renewal volume also will move up. That's the reason we're able to say that this year, we expect a rising atchmaking double-digit growth on the billing volume, maximum salary crossing INR 130 cr- INR 500 crore this year. That's the current context.
Understood. Actually, with regards to the northern markets, how do you really think we can make a larger impact there? Are there any specific strategies that we will be adopting to ramp up our share in the northern markets and even Eastern markets?
Yeah, we are working on probably next quarter or something, probably be able to communicate better because we are just discussing what should be the approach to do towards our northern markets as one of the markets that I know that we are not able to make any significant progress in driving the market. We are working on some strategies. Hopefully, next quarter, we're able to probably communicate better on it.
Got it. With regards to the matrimony, you know, the marketplace business, the wedding business, is there a product market fit that we are seeing? Is it going to remain at this level? I mean, when can we think of a scale-up happening here?
Yeah, it's a good question. We are changing the model, and that's something being piloted in Tamil Nadu. We are working on the commission-based model. It's in the early stages. We believe that instead of the subscription model, getting a commission on the service offered, that's something we believe may be the right strategy. Once I see the product market space and the decent uptake, while you're able to get people to pay some money to all the services, you're working towards increasing the fulfillment rate of the people interested in wedding services. That's something we're working on. Once we're able to get the product market to a decent scale and size and also on the fulfillment rate, probably we'll take that into other markets. It's not that what it was we are here in terms of simply a subscription-based model when that continues.
The focus is mainly on the commission-based model. That's what we are attempting to do in one market.
Understood. I think the question on the astrology bit is very relevant. I think, as we know the numbers that these online astrology platforms are kind of showing, it becomes even more important for a company like you. Is there anything that you are really working on there that you can speak of?
Yeah, we are working on AI astrology services. We also, basically, are going to invest some money in one of the startups working on AI astrology services. That's also happening. While internally we are trying to do our AI astrology services, we're also going to put the money into a company startup working on AI astrology services. We are doing what we can internally with our corporate chat with our AI model platform, let's say AI human. The company we as well invest is completely on AI astrology services. We want to do our edge as well. It's putting opportunity on this our company working with.
Understood. Any last thoughts on how, I mean, any shareholder returns, buybacks, etc., that you're planning?
That's something the board will decide when the buyback period is over. The board will decide whether they want any buyback or something that will happen. Dividend will always be cleared, a certain dividend brought on account of annuity. For today, we're giving you a certain dividend. The board will decide what kind of payback the shareholders after profit stages are.
Got it. Thank you. Thanks. Those are all my questions.
Yeah.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, if you wish to ask a question, please press star and one. As there are no further questions, I will now hand the conference over to the management for their closing comments.
Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Jayaram Shetty. I think one of the points I want to say is that there are almost INR 11 cr assistance between the billing and gap revenue. If the billing and gap revenue being the same, there are other additional probably around INR 80 cr-INR 100 cr into the profit. Again, as our CFO said, the coming quarter, the gap revenue also catch up. While the Q2 is a similar number on account of when we see some architects also the billing to gap revenue is continuing on the gap, we expect the number to move up from quarter three onward. To not too large extent, the gap revenue need to, you know, plate from Q2 and Q3. The profit increased from the quarter three onward. The Q1 is an indication of the building and the operating team.
If the same gap revenue means the building did the same, the profit has been probably around INR 17 cr also. That's the point I want to say that. The plan for a continued support.
Thank you. On behalf of ICICI Securities, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your line.