Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the Q1 FY 2027 earnings conference call hosted by Nuvoco Vistas Corporation 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 the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star then zero on your touchtone phone. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Bishnu Sharma, Head of Investor Relations from Nuvoco. Thank you, and over to you.
Thank you, uncertain, and good evening, everyone, and welcome to Nuvoco's Q1 FY 2027 earnings call. Thank you for joining us today. To begin with, I would like to mention on our performance for the quarter first. We have had a strong start to the year, delivering higher business performance. Volume grew by 5% YoY to 5.3 million tonnes, and EBITDA increased by 7% YoY to INR 572 crore, marking the highest ever first quarter volume and EBITDA of the company. The performance is on the backdrop of the geopolitical tensions which prevailed during the quarter, which had a cascading effect on business environment in which we operate. The West Asia conflict, which drove up energy, packing bags, and other raw material prices, was not the only challenge during the quarter.
We also faced logistical constraints, with railway rates being prioritized for the power sector amid an intense and prolonged summer. Further, one of our key states in the east was undergoing state elections during the period. That said, we performed well in Q1 FY 2027 despite the macro headwinds. The performance reflects resilient execution supported by continuous focus on cost discipline and operational efficiencies. To specifically highlight, fuel cost was contained at 1.52 per MMBtu, which remained within the guided range communicated in the last quarter conference call. This was achieved through fuel mix optimization and coordinated effort of our team. Coming to Gujarat, I'm pleased to say that we have inaugurated 2 million tonnes per annum of grinding capacity at Surat on 11th July 2026 ahead of schedule.
This represents a defining milestone in the history of the company, signifying our first ever capacity expansion in the western region. This achievement is strong testament to the company's project execution capability, which will not only enable a significant expansion of our market presence in the west but also strengthen our position in the north by releasing much-needed capacity at our western plants for the northern market. The clinker and the grinding unit at Kutch are also progressing well and remain on track for phased operational from Q3 FY 2027. Let me highlight some of the key developments and progress made on these units so far. At Kutch, for the clinker unit deliveries of all major equipment and spares have been completed, and execution across all sections remains firmly on track. Reconditioning of coal and raw mills VRM gearbox has been completed.
Kiln rotation is also complete and is now ready for brick lining. We'll complete overlaying of all major equipment and initiate trial preparation within Q2 FY 2027. As far as grinding unit at Kutch is concerned, civil works are underway and progressing as planned. Major RCC work in packing plant hopper building has been completed. Civil works are targeted for completion by Q2 FY 2027, enabling the release of fronts for mechanical and electrical installations. On the railway siding at Kutch, earthwork has been completed, and ballast and sleeper laying are currently in progress. Once operational, the siding is expected to enhance logistical efficiency. Moreover, we have also commenced work on the bulk cement terminal at Sachana in Gujarat, which will also have a dedicated railway siding.
This facility is targeted to be operational by Q2 FY 2028 and will act as a strategic distribution hub, helping us strengthen our presence and further expand our reach across the Gujarat market. For our east operations, we continue to progress on our plan to add 4 million tonnes per annum of capacity in phases till FY 2028. Looking ahead, we continue to hold a positive outlook on cement demand, which stayed healthy throughout the quarter. Just to highlight, central government CapEx increased by 13% YoY to INR 2.5 lakh crore in the quarter-to-date period through May 2026, already accounting for nearly 20% of the full year planned CapEx. As highlighted earlier, both central and state governments are targeting CapEx growth of around 20% and 15%, respectively, for FY 2027. Accordingly, infra spending led by government CapEx and along with housing projects is expected to provide sustained support to demand.
From a geopolitical standpoint, we remain watchful and continue to monitor the situation closely. If the geopolitical situation stabilizes and the conflict deescalates, we are cautiously optimistic about navigating the coming quarters well. As demonstrated in Q1, where we proactively worked on our internal levers to deliver strong cost and operational performance, we remain confident in our ability to manage through headwinds. Regardless of how the scenario unfolds, we remain firmly committed to driving cost efficiencies and operational excellence across the business. We will continue to pursue with same rigor through prudent procurement, continued cost optimization, and ongoing improvement in supply chain efficiency to deliver resilient performance going forward. With that, I conclude my opening remarks. I'm here with Mr. Jayakumar Krishnaswamy, Managing Director of Nuvoco Vistas, and Mr. Maneesh Agrawal, Chief Financial Officer. We're happy to answer any questions you may have. Thank you, uncertain. Over to you.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star one on their touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star 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. We'll take our first question from the line of Siddharth Mehrotra from Axis Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi.
Mr. Mehrotra. I'm sorry, sir. Can you just repeat your question again?
Can you hear me now? Am I audible?
Yes.
Perfect. Just wanted to check since our Surat plant is now online-
I can't hear you. I guess don't put on speakerphone, please. You got to take the handset and talk because you're very feeble.
Is it better now?
Okay, give it a try.
Just wanted to check, sir, given that our Surat plant is now online, what sort of volume cadence are we looking at for this year? Secondly, given the fact that our clinker capacities are yet to come online, what will be the source of clinker for this capacity?
Okay. If you remember, in all my previous calls, we had very clearly explained the sequence of startup with Surat coming in Q2, Q3 this year, and then the clinker capacity in Kutch comes in Q3, Q4 this year, and then on the WHR and the grinding unit later as we are deciding. Right from the beginning, it was clear that when we start Surat, we will have to get clinker from elsewhere and not from Kutch. Currently, before Vadodara started, we were anyway selling close to 1 million tonnes in Gujarat, which came from our Chittorgarh and Nimbol plants.
What's going to happen is the 1 million tonne anyway will come from Chittorgarh and Nimbol in the balance period, and also till such time, even it'll go all the way up to about 1.4 million tonnes, 1.5 million tonnes in annual basis from Chittorgarh and Nimbol plant. The balance, our target is when we complete Q4 this year, our sale in Gujarat will be anywhere close to about 2 million tonnes as an annual sale. Basically, it'll be about 1.6, 1.7 lakh tonnes per month in the Q4 of this year, which would mean it'll be about 30,000, 40,000, 50,000 tonnes more than the average run rate which we're selling currently in Gujarat.
For that, we need clinker, those clinker will come from our Chhattisgarh cluster, that's how even the first dispatches are made through clinker, which is sourced from Chhattisgarh cluster. I can't move clinker from Chittorgarh into Surat because that clinker is needed for the north market. We are also looking at some other options, like bartering with other companies, whereas we can give some clinker in east and also pick up clinker from north, which will be much more economical than moving our own clinker from Chhattisgarh cluster into Surat. That net, at the initial till such time Kutch comes on stream, which earliest will be January this year, maybe give or take one or two months. By start of fiscal FY 2028, we'll have Kutch clinker coming into Surat.
For the balance, currently 1.5 million tonne sale and Q4, 2 million tonne sale. For incremental sale, clinker will come from Chhattisgarh cluster.
Understood, sir. My understanding is that on an incremental basis, we'll perhaps do close to 1 million tonnes extra in Gujarat. Is that correct?
Currently, we're doing 1.3 million, 1.4 million. Balance, 0.6 million tonnes. We will have extra sale in Gujarat in the latter half year since we've launched the product and then covering most of Gujarat now. Q4, we'll sell 2 million tonnes annualized rates. For the incremental volume of cement, clinker will come from Chhattisgarh.
Got it, sir. That's very clear. Secondly, sir, just wanted to check, our East debottlenecking plants seem to be sort of facing some delays. From what I recall, last time we had CTO for two of our plants around two MTPA capacity, but there seems to be no updates regarding that. Sir, anything you want to add to that?
No, we had debottlenecking happening in Jajpur, Jojobera, Panagarh, and Arasmeta. Last time in the call, I had said we had got our CTO for our Panagarh and Jojobera facility. I think those two plants are almost done. Jajpur is a place where there's something called an NIPL certificate, which you have to get because when your capacity increases less than 50% of the installed capacity, then you don't go through the normal EC route, you get through NIPL route. There, I think, the Jajpur thing is currently underway. Arasmeta, the technical design is completed. We are more or less at the commercial conversations about the ball mill procurement and rest of the civil ordering is being done. By the time we complete this fiscal, we should be ready on all four fronts.
Suffice to say that these capacities which we were installing, commissioning, and expanding in East was not needed to sell products for the fiscal FY 2027. It will be needed in fiscal FY 2028 only because with the current sale plan and the current ambition for the company in fiscal FY 2027, we have adequate capacity in all our grinding station. We need more flexibility for statewide capacity, and that's the reason why we're not pursuing at a rigorous pace for B. By the end of this fiscal 2027, three plants will be fully commissioned and ready for volumes for FY 2028. Arasmeta should be on by end of this fiscal 2027 and will be available in Q1 FY 2028. Those plants are also on stream. Just want to assure all of you that there is no delay because of modifications involved or really minor modifications, not major modifications.
Overall CapEx cost was pretty less for all these four plants. Just that the timing and the phasing is there. Right now, we are not hard pressed for capacity, so I'm not really pursuing it at a rigor. two plants' CTO is done. The other two plants will open in the next six to eight months.
Understood, sir. Thank you.
Thank you. We'll take our next question from the line of Amit Murarka from Axis Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi. Good evening, thanks for the opportunity. Just wanted to understand the pricing and costs a bit better. We see that you had quite a strong pricing improvement in the quarter. At the same time, there was some moderation in the YoY growth, roughly 4%. Wanted to understand, was there also a change in mix between trade and non-trade which happened in the quarter? Is the pricing gain attributable purely to market level price hikes?
Sir, you're on mute.
Sorry, I was on mute. Thank you for the question. Last time when we met was in the conference call in April. That was when the entire Middle East was raging. One of the big things which was happening in the industry as well as for ourselves was we had to do a price correction to defray the cost increases. Overall, if you look at the April month, subsequently the full quarter. For the quarter, we had a trade price increase, which it increased more, overall, it got tempered. For a full quarter level, we got an INR 10 per bag increase in trade and INR 20 per bag increase in non-trade in the quarter for Hindi. In north, again, we got about INR 10 per bag in trades and about INR 10, INR 12 in non-trade.
Throughout the quarter, if you look, we had a price increase of close to about Just a second. The previous paragraph. The bar chart. Overall, we got overall price increase of close to about INR 240 in the entire quarter. One more unique thing is when we went to the end of the quarter, we exited June quarter with price increase more than the average for the quarter. That kind of stayed put as we started the month of July. I will also try and give a detailed breakup of the realization and the cost impact. Overall, if you see, our realization has gone up by close to about INR 320 Q1 versus Q4. That came mostly through three reasons. One was the NSR increase, second was the geo mix, which we played in key markets of Chhattisgarh, Rajasthan, Western MP, and Jharkhand.
Also the price increase in the last 15 days of March, which kind of gave a fillip to the first month of the quarter. Hence, we got a realization increase of INR 320. This INR 320 got kind of set off by cost inflation, which I mentioned during the previous call. The first cost increase happened for the quarter Q1 versus Q4. Power and fuel went up by approximately INR 40 per tonne. Raw material costs also went up close to about INR 35, INR 40 per tonne. Packing bags, I mentioned about the granule issues as well as the capacity shortage and the jute issue from Bangladesh, which overall increased the packing bag cost. That also increased by close to INR 15 per tonne. The volume impact from Q4 to Q1 resulted a little bit of a fixed cost de-leverage of close to about INR 30, INR 40.
Other one which also impacted the Q1 was the distribution cost. Freight costs for the company like to like from Q4 to Q1 went by close to INR 15, largely coming out of suboptimal movement because of diesel shortage and truck shortage in certain states, and also due to the fact that the railways stopped supplying adequate number of rakes due to coal movement, and we resulted moving clinker by road. Net-net realization happened INR 320, and the cost increase was close to about INR 230, which reflects in the EBITDA impact of close to about INR 90. That's been the story of Q1 when compared to Q4.
Got it. Thanks for the elaborate answer on that one. Pricing, just to understand better, I think you mentioned that your realization improvement was better than the market. That was a function of geo mix optimization as well as more trade in the mix or how is it?
Three things. One is obviously price increase happened. That is the biggest lever is the price increase, close to about INR 10 in trade and about INR 15 in non-trade. That's kind of the biggest impact on the overall realization improvement. Second one is obviously we are a premium player with increased sale in Concreto Uno and Duraguard Microfiber. I'm happy to report to all of you that both these brands have become a 1 million tonne brand now. We are very happy that in a very short span of time, these two brands have now become annualized 1 million tonne sale added to Concreto, which is close to about 3.9 million tonnes. We are safely seated with 4 million tonnes of Concreto, 1 million of Microfiber, and 1 million of Mansova. We are close to about 5 million tonnes of Mansova premium products. That's the second reason.
The third one was the positive impact due to increased sales in Chhattisgarh, Jharkhand, Rajasthan and Western M.P., which are high realization markets for us. Three reasons. One is price, second is premium, third is geo mix.
Sure. Thanks a lot. I'll come back in the queue.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, in order to ensure that management is able to answer queries from all the participants in the queue, kindly restrict your questions to two at a time. You may join back the queue for follow-up questions. We'll take our next question from the line of Satyadeep Jain from Ambit Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thank you. First, I wanted to understand, so you discussed all the line items on the cost side. Where the fuel costs have been, what kind of additional inflation do you see in 2Q end? Would that be the peak and you start seeing moderation? Just trying to understand fuel inventory and where packaging costs and all are.
Satyadeep, just for clarification, are you asking about the fuel bet for the company specifically?
No. You said there has been inflation.
Right. Can you please speak little bit louder? I'm missing few words in your question, please.
Yes. You mentioned the fuel consumption cost was INR 1.53 per million kcal. Where the fuel costs have trended-
Okay
Over the last few months. Where do you see fuel and packaging and all these costs? Has there been improvement on the rail evacuation? Just trying to understand what kind of.
Okay
improvement you see in two.
Yeah. I will give you the reasons. I will have to split the whole bet into east operations of Nuvoco and north operations of Nuvoco. North operations of Nuvoco is largely pet coke driven with 23%-24% of AFR in both the Chittor and Nimbol facility. Whereas on east operations, we have close to about 30% of pet coke and balance is domestic open market coal and linkage coal and very small amount of AFR issues to the tune of about maximum Risda 10% and overall range of about 4%-5%. That's how we have been operating till this crisis happened. Every crisis is an opportunity for us to look into the operations and revisit the entire assumptions. What we did in Q1 was three things we did.
One was question the very principle of using pet coke, hence our teams did a wonderful job by curtailing the use of pet coke in north from excess of 50% to about 42% number. For the first time, we could move domestic open market coal from Chhattisgarh cluster to our Chittor plant and also from Varanasi depot to our Nimbol plant. Even though the normal rate we couldn't have used this coal, because of the heightened value price of pet coke, these two became viable hence we kind of moved material from Varanasi depot to Nimbol and Chhattisgarh, Nagpur to our Chittor plant. That's how the north pet coke consumption reduced from over 50% to about 40%. That's about the north bet. When it came to east, we have the Risda factory, Sonadih and Arasmeta.
In all these three plants, we had pet coke consumption excess of about 30% was the number. During this quarter we were lucky enough to contract coal from Eastern Coalfields, which is called Sonepur Bazari, whose ash content is much better than the other linkage coal ash content. I think our purchase team did a wonderful job. By using this specific variety of coal which comes from West Bengal, whose ash percentage is much lower than the Chhattisgarh coal. The number two thing which we did was we started adding little bit of sweetener in our Risda factory. Sweetener is again a better quality limestone. So we started using better quality limestone, whose CO₂ and LSF is much better in our Risda kiln and also in our Sonadih cement ML1 line.
By increasing sweetener usage, increasing the Sonepur Bazari coal, we successfully brought down the pet coke consumption during the quarter. Much so in Arasmeta, as we speak, we are operating at zero pet coke consumption and in Risda factory from close to about 37% pet coke consumption, we've already come to about 25% pet coke consumption. The cost increase due to sweetener is much lower than the cost reduction coming out of pet coke. This was a big agenda which we drew in our Chhattisgarh cluster and north was getting linkage coal, domestic open market coal to the north factory. All these contributed to the overall fuel cost being capped at INR 1.52 per million kcal.
Sir, how do you look at the trajectory, given you may have consumed pet coke which was lower cost and the trajectory kept moving up? Mainly on packaging and fuel cost and also railway, has there been improvement in rake availability? Just trying to understand what happened in 1Q, how do you look at the trajectory in 2Q, 3Q?
Okay. Looking at what we face going forward in Q2 . First would be fuel. I think we have adequate inventory of pet coke for the entire quarter at similar cost levels. My fuel inflation is not likely to go up by big numbers. I won't be exactly able to tell whether it'll be INR 1.52 per million kcal or INR 1.55 per million kcal, but it's not to spoil my game in Q2 . That's the first one. The second thing is about packaging bags. I think packaging bags has peaked in Q4 and Q1 with highest demand and West Asia credits also fuel the granule price. I think granule prices have started coming down and also with the demand also will come down due to monsoon. Bag availability should not be a problem.
The increase in bag which happened close to about INR 50 in Q1 versus Q4, I expect cooling off of that price to around INR 20, INR 25 in Q2 versus Q1. Bag price will come down. Fuel will more or less get capped. The third one, which hit us negative, was the non-availability of rakes and we ended up moving clinker by road. Again, after 15th of July, once the monsoon sets in, I think the coal fields will get flooded and it'll not be possible for coal to move and also the overall power demand in the country will come down with monsoon setting in. Coal, the government's mandate of moving coal from coal fields to the power plant will also taper down.
Already in the last one week, we typically get about four rakes per day for clinker movement, it kind of come down to 3.2, 3.3 in Q1 . We already started getting in the last one week, four rakes per day. Going forward from now till the next two to three months, it will be certainly four rakes per day and we'll stock clinker in our grinding unit. Last but not the least, the lean season discount will also kick in from 1st of August, that's a welcome sign. This time the government of India has said even for clinker movement, there's going to be lean season discount, unlike only for cement in the past. We'll get a benefit of railway freight, which will come down.
Availability of rakes will eliminate our movement of clinker by road, packaging back will kind of cool down. Fuel cost will be almost in the same place. Technically, we are looking at cost lines more or less same. The only thing which will be adverse in Q2 when compared to Q1 will be the power and fuel cost. Fuel will remain the same. Power cost will go up by close to about INR 40, INR 50 per tonne simply because this is a shutdown time when we have to have two of our kilns are going down in the next two months. Also all our VRMs and ball mills will also go for shutdown in the next two, three months. There'll be a decrease in power cost. Fuel cost will be kind of capped.
Net, there'll be an increase in power and fuel cost by some INR 30, INR 40 per tonne.
Thank you so much for this explanation. Just one more question on-
Satyadeep, I request you to join back the queue, please, as we have participants waiting for their turn.
Sure.
Thank you. We'll take our next question from the line of Tejas Pradhan from Citigroup. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, sir. Was there any change in the lead distance this quarter versus last quarter?
Very interestingly, I think last quarter we were close to about 325 kms. Right now, it's about 327km, 328km. Not much of difference in lead distance. Also rail coefficient was 62% road and 38% rail. In Q4, it's about 54%, 36% right now. 54%, 46%, sorry.
Okay. Sure. On the premium product share and share of trade sales for the quarter?
Okay. Premium, we are about Q1 versus Q4 was peaked at 44%. This quarter premium is 42%. Trade mix continues to be same, 75/75, not much of change in trade mix.
Okay. Understood. Lastly, on the net debt number for the quarter.
Yeah. Net debt, we ended the quarter with INR 4,595 crores and corresponding quarter last year was INR 5,274 crores. A good INR 600 crore reduction from last June 2025 to June 2026.
Sure. Thanks.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Shravan Shah from Dolat Capital. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thank you, sir. Sir, just to get a couple of things clarity. Sir, you mentioned that the exit June cement prices or the realization is higher versus a 1Q or 5.27 average. Can you quantify, will it be a kind of a INR 5, INR 10 per bag higher?
We reported 1Q versus 4Q was close to INR 320 realization improvement. Which would mean exit June is slightly lower than the average June because the price increase happened at the beginning of the quarter. However, as we start the quarter, one of the things I've seen this industry for a few years now, the welcome sign is there is no price drop in the first 14 days of July, which is a welcome sign. I think we are holding onto our prices. Normally monsoon, there's always a drop in price. The first two weeks of the month, it's steady and then I'm holding on to all the prices which I had in the month of June.
Even though we still have not taken a price increase, I think prices holding on first fortnight of July, I think it is something which is unique for this year. It is a welcome sign. Still, we will not wait for an opportunity. As of now, costs are kind of stable, certainly I think if the costs were to go southwards, I will take price northwards.
Okay. Now, sir, given that once Surat we have already started, let us say in Q3, once we start the commercial production for the Kutch level, maybe in the full phases in the Q4, how do we kind of assess on that part, if we have to see on a profitability front, it may be much, much lower versus currently what we are having a profitability or how one can look at, or if it is lower by, how many quarters one can see that profitability of Kutch, including the Surat grinding would be at par with the company average?
Look, I guess whenever you expand in any region with huge capacity, any cement player who has expanded capacity in a particular region or in a particular state, something, if you have to kind of get volumes going in there as quickly as possible, because having put so much of CapEx, I need volumes very quickly. I need to get back my investment as fast as possible. We will play an aggressive way to sell our product. One thing is for sure, my positioning as an A group will never reduce. Our product, even in the markets where we operate in Rajasthan, Western U.P., Western M.P., Haryana, Delhi, even in Gujarat, I am an A group player, and I am far ahead of any of those other B group players. There are one or two guys who are almost equal, but they are ahead of us.
That is something which positioning is going to be very, very key for us. Also in Gujarat, non-state realization contribution is also quite good with OPC and almost equal to rest of the product. Gujarat contribution will be quite good. On the initial stages, for me to establish the market, I will have to be aggressive. What is the positive Nuvoco has? Nuvoco is not a new entrant in Gujarat. Nuvoco has been in Gujarat for the last two years, and we already sell close to about 1.5 milion tonnes Already. Currently, we are selling 1.3 million tonnes, 1.4 million tonnes, whose pricing is almost equal to the big players in Gujarat. When I am going to increase volume, I am not going to dilute price. My job is to get more franchisees, dealers, and expand the dealer network.
I think I have personally met hundreds of dealers, and our teams have connected with 300, 400 dealers in the last five to six months. Market development is at full swing. We are pretty confident that the people, the dealers' fraternity in Gujarat, are very keen to have Nuvoco in places where we are currently not there. Before launch of Gujarat, we were present in Baroda, we are present in Godhra, we are present in Surat, we are present in Ahmedabad, Banaskantha, all these places were there. Over a period of last six months, we also launched a product in Rajkot, Saurashtra, and Bhuj, Gandhidham, those areas. Our pricing has been very good in those products and current contribution margin and our realization is not less than any other major competitor in Gujarat.
Net-net, I am fairly confident that we will not dilute prices to push volumes in Gujarat. Of course, we will have to run some trade schemes to get people working for us. In general, our positioning will be good. Our premiumization will continue to be there. We will focus on Duraguard Microfiber. All this will offset the potential decrease in EBITDA per ton, because my cost will be high in the first year. That is the nature of the game. Overall, I do not think we can judge the performance by the first year of launch into Gujarat. Our modeling very clearly says in year two and year three, EBITDA per tonne in Gujarat will be equal to EBITDA per ton of rest of North India.
Okay.
Thank you.
Great. Yeah. Can I ask one more?
Thank you, Shravan. I request you to join back the queue, please. Thank you.
Okay.
We'll take our next question from the line of Pinakin Parekh from HSBC. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Thank you very much. My first question is.
Pinakin, can you use your handset mode, please? Your audio is not very clear.
Yeah.
I'm sorry, you're sounding muffled.
Give me a second. I will just change this.
Right, Pinakin, slightly feeble. If you can speak a little bit louder, please.
Yeah, sure. If I look at Nuvoco EBITDA per tonne, over the last six years, it has ranged between INR 700- INR 900 a ton, before the last two quarters ranging towards 1,000 and higher. Do you think the step by to see?
Pinakin, I'm sorry, you're sounding muffled.
Can't hear you, Pinakin. I think other than the first sentence, not audible.
Okay. Let me rejoin the queue.
It is a little better now. Just go ahead.
Yeah. If I look at the EBITDA per tonne, do you see the current EBITDA profitability? We know seasonally second quarter is weak, but sustained over the next few quarters, can Nuvoco deliver over INR 1,000 a tonne? Ultimately, it's dependent on pricing, but how do you see pricing therefore evolve, given what was commented by other industry players in May of holding back capacity expansions?
Pinakin, I guess, I will not be able to give a guidance on what will be the EBITDA per tonne going forward. That's not appropriate. Certainly, I think one of the things which works for us is our geo mix premiumization, our trade not fair, and our blended cement. Those are the strengths of Nuvoco and the positioning of Nuvoco, which will be there. When you compare with what was the past period and what do I see now and future, I think the past period, last FY 2023, 2024, 2025, had very specific events in the industry which kind of impacted the overall pricing in the industry. If you would see, I think all of you observe the market, and we also observe the market.
If you see certainly in the last three, four, five quarters, I think profitability is very important, and it's important for us, and I'm sure for everybody else in the industry. Hence, I think pricing is relatively stable in the last one and a half years. I also see going forward, pricing is going to be pretty stable, and I'm sure all of you heard the investors calls for other companies. I'm not going to comment on that, but I guess all of us realize that there will be capacity expansion, but capacity expansion is not going to be at the breakneck speed. Since capacity expansion is not going to be at a breakneck speed, and it will be in a sensible pace, and also with the internal levers of our company, I believe price will be stable going forward.
With the stable price and the positioning of our company in terms of product, portfolio, market, geo mix, I think we will be better off in managing, improving the profitability levels in the coming quarters.
Thank you, sir. That is very helpful. Just moving on to my second question. The more accepted norm with investors is that North is the most profitable market in the country, and East is under pressure, and for the last five years, East was impacted by more supply. This year there is supply, but we don't see more capacity additions being announced in East. In your view, what will take East pricing structurally higher over the next couple of years? What will it require for East to close the gap with North?
I think from the capacity expansion announcements which have been informed by all the major players, there are not many clinker units which are going to come in the next three years. I think there are a couple of them which are coming, and those couple of them are not going to disturb this. The clinker used to be about 40 million tonnes, 42 million tonnes capacity that went to close to about 60 million tonnes. That was a period of last three, four years when all the capacities bunched up around the same time and did not give elbow room for pricing to improve. That is done, and from the announcements, all of us know that in the next three years, there are going to be only max three and at the best two.
Even if someone were to announce, it's going to take anywhere between FY 2029 and then thereabout. With market growing at 7%, 8% conservatively, very soon, in the next 18-24 months, capacity utilization of the entire East is going to again cross 80%. If it were to go to 80%, pricing will become stronger, and obviously profitability in East also will improve. That's the way I'm looking at. I won't be able to put an exact number whether profitability in East will be equal to profitability in North. I know our company, what kind of profitability we get in the region. I'm fairly confident the profitability which we are getting in East is good now, and will continue to be good going forward.
Got it. This is very helpful. Thank you very much, sir.
We'll take our next question from the line of Jashandeep Singh Chadha from Nomura. Please go ahead.
Hi. Thank you for the opportunity. Congratulations on a very good set of numbers despite challenging environment. My first question is regarding your CapEx guidance, which you gave last quarter, INR 900 crore and INR 960 crore for FY 2027, 2028. Is there any change in that? My second question will be on how are you seeing, first quarter has been completed and second quarter is going on, so how are you seeing demand for FY 2027? Because last quarter, a lot of your peers painted a very bearish picture in terms of demand for this year. How are you evaluating the demand this year?
Okay. CapEx first, I guess, I communicated in the last call that the outlook for FY 2027 CapEx was INR 900 crore. It continues to be INR 900 crore. In Q1, we have spent close to about INR 370 crore. The balance money will be spent in the next three quarters. We're more or less on course to complete what we intended to do this year. Next year, again, with the expansion of [Grand great] to be completed, and then the Sachana bulk terminal, which got announced, and routine CapEx in the plants, I'm looking at close to about anywhere between INR 950 to INR 1,000 crore number. That's the range as I look at now. This year, INR 900, next year, INR 950 to INR 1,000, give or take INR 10, INR 20 crore here and there.
That's going to be the outlook. As regards the other point regarding the cement demand. I think demand in Q1 was still a little bit more than we delivered because we could have delivered more in Q1 as well. For the rake availability, we lost some production sale in April, May, June. I could have easily done close to about 200,000 tonnes more because the demand was decent. Just because we couldn't get rakes and then diesel shortage and Chhattisgarh trucks would not move to Maharashtra and MP because there was no return load, and we had serious bunching of rakes in Northeast as well as in Bengal. It's not as if the overall sales growth could have been more, which should have been more for us, did not happen the way I thought. Market demand, I thought, was anywhere close to 7%, 7.5% in Q1.
Going forward, also, I'm looking at the market demand around the same number. Certainly, Jharkhand is doing well. After many quarters in Odisha, we did very well in Q1. Bihar continues to be a strong citadel for us. I guess I'm looking at a demand anywhere between 7% and 8% in the next three quarters.
Thank you for that, sir. Sir, my second question is regarding Gujarat profitability. I understand, and you have already given an elaborate answer on that from the second and third quarter, Gujarat profitability will be in line with rest of Nuvoco. I still want to focus on Surat GU, because even when the Kutch clinker unit comes, I think Chittorgarh is still nearer to Surat plant than the Kutch unit. How will the profitability Is it fair to assume that Kutch will be more profitable in terms of EBITDA pattern than Surat unit? Or is the company working on something to improve the profitability of Surat? Just want you to focus on that.
Technically, if you see the reason why I won't compare performance to other companies which you put a plant in Kutch, that's one of the hypothesis we thought, and that's the reason why we decided to put a grinding unit in Kutch. Without a grinding unit and only a clinker unit, got 3.5 , 4 million tonne of clinker either by sea route was almost a difficult proposition for anybody who tried doing it. Original assumption was that at that time, I guess that's probably a very difficult assumption one made, and that's the reason once we kind of got into the act and we very early in that acquisition and reconstruction phase, we decided that to make this entire model work well, we need three ways to make this model successful.
The first way is to get clinker through maritime route into Hazira Port and into Surat. Certainly, I think two, three months of the year when the monsoon happens, clinker cannot be moved, hence we needed railway. Fortunately for us, railways line was coming till Waghai, and I think within three, four months, that program of railways came into being and we immediately latched on, we modified our project plan, and we decided to go for the railway line. Once we had the railway line and then also the jetty movement, our clinker movement via marine route or through the rake route is a certainty. Of course, moving clinker through jetty route, marine route is far cheaper than moving by rail. That's clear. Second thing we did was, if we had to move clinker all the way, because Gujarat market is a lot OPC market.
If I had to move clinker to Surat, grind in Surat, whereas the market is also going to be in Ahmedabad, rest of the place, I'll do reverse movement. Hence the entire idea of setting up a GU happened in Kutch and also with the incentive scheme available in Gujarat, it became economically sensible for us to put a full-fledged GU there. I will make OPC and or PPC and sell in Kutch and rest of the Morbi Kandla area from our Kutch plant. The third idea which we implemented is the Sachana bulk terminal. With the BCFC-M, the railways BCF wagon movement, which we will also invest there, we are working on whether lease or proceed, which had an option that on the return freight, return was zero freight. It was only forward freight.
We decided that instead of taking clinker, we would much rather grind the clinker and take OPC to Sachana, in Sachana, we'll move from rake bulker to road bulker. Once we do de-bulk into road, Sachana is only 40 odd kilometers from Ahmedabad, the core market. I would do Mehsana, Ahmedabad, and the rest of the region, I'll do bulker movement from our Sachana unit. Sachana unit also has a bag packing facility. In case I have to sell cement in bag, I also will sell cement in bag from our Sachana. Technically speaking, Kutch plant GU will help me sell in Kutch and part of Saurashtra up to Morbi.
I come to Sachana, which will help me sell to Rajkots and all the way to Ahmedabad, Surat will help me sell in Surat, going all the way to Vapi and even Mumbai, and also upwards to Godhra. In the border area of Rajasthan, I still get cement from Chittorgarh. That's the overall plan which we have envisaged, and it's far less riskier than what others have attempted in the past.
Thank you.
Thanks so much.
We have our next question from the line of Rajesh Ravi from HDFC Securities. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Hi, good evening, sir. Am I audible?
Yes.
Yes, Rajesh, you're audible.
Great, sir. On great set of numbers. Sir, my question pertains to guidance for FY 2027. Firstly, if you look at what I understand in Q2, The fall in packing cost will offset the power cost increase due to the plant shutdowns. Mostly your variable cost seems to be stable quarter-on-quarter in Q2, and there would be overlay and maintenance cost, which will have some drag on the cost line item. Given that if prices were to remain stable Would that mean we will have another strong quarter in terms of margins upward of INR 900 or closer to INR 900 sort of margins, assuming prices remain stable where they are?
That's very difficult, Rajesh, to give that information. I wish price 15 days is stable. I think hopefully price is going to be stable, and also kind of the cost inflation with the kind of targets which I have. I'm looking at anyway about 100 odd INR in increase in cost line in Q2 versus Q1. That's the way I'm looking at right now. It's too early in the day for me to kind of put a finger on it. As I see with the fuel cost, with the inventories which I have and the packing cost, which has happened in 15 days, and the price holding back and shutdown plant which we have, this is the kind of number we are working on for Q2 today.
Total cost you're looking at INR 100 inflation quarter-on-quarter, obviously the pricing will decide your margins, right?
Yeah. One can safely say it'll be there about there. Give or take some INR 20, 30 we should always plan because it's not such an accurate industry. Small variables will always happen.
Sure.
Some uncertainties will creep in the quarter.
Subsequently, because Q2, you're not seeing any large impact of fuel price increases. In subsequent quarters, given the current prices The new purchases hereon will be flowing into a lower cost. Purchases which you have ordered in month of, say, May, June, early July, they would be at elevated cost. Would that further increase your cost number in Q3 in terms of fuel cost?
Yeah, it's possible, because technically, Q3, I think the little bit higher cost inventories will come. Some of the things which we have done, I won't be able to tell on the call. I think our purchase team has been very smart to find out what consignments and what price to book and what price not to book. Suffice to say that there's going to be impact, but it is not going to kind of change the overall game big time. Unless and until here and now, because pet coke went all the way to INR 2.56 per million calorific value. We refused to book at that prices. We kind of curtailed the booking at much lower at 205 or 215 was the number which we booked.
Okay.
This is all helping us.
Sure.
If the [petcoke] price were to continue this way for a month or two months, things have started cooling down. If it were to continue, I guess then anybody can guess what will happen.
Understood. Sir, any volume guidance for FY 2027?
Rajesh, I request you to join back the queue, please, as we have participants waiting for their turn.
I'll just complete this question and move on. Any volume guidance for FY 2027, sir, you're looking at?
I think our target is to get close to about 7%, 8% of market growth, so that we would go for it. With the incremental volume anyway will come for us in Gujarat. Obviously, North we are very strong and Gujarat volume will always add to the overall volume growth of the company. Which I'm really targeting mid 7%, 8% kind of a number.
Great. That's all from my end. Thank you. Will come back. Thank you.
Thank you. We will take our next question from the line of Jyoti Gupta from Ashika Institutional Equities. Please go ahead.
Good evening, sir. I will go back to the same question in terms of realization. If I understand the revenue breakup is 60% east and 40% north. Correct me if I am wrong. Despite moderation in costs, which apparently is through the high use of coal and less use of pet coke, how has the price realizations improved in north and east, and should that be the case for the entire industry? Is there some spillover from the fourth quarter into the first quarter because realizations to INR 240 per tonne is slightly I am not able to understand this number. Maybe if you can explain to me again, I will be able to understand that better.
I kind of explained that in the QoQ, which is Q4 versus Q1. Through the quarter in north, I added INR 10 per bag price increase in trade and close to about anywhere between 10 to 15, 12, 13 INR per bag on non-trade. That is where the impact of INR 10 is certainly INR 200 per tonne and then INR 15, it is also INR 300 per tonne. Our proportion of trade and non-trade in northern region is more than the proportion of trade and non-trade in east. To that extent, the weighted average price came to around mid in between 200 and 300. That is how I try to explain.
Mathematically, if I were to go to 40% in north and 60% in east, I do not think at this point of time, I am able to give exactly how much we benefited north and how much we benefited east. As a whole of company, we have got a price increase of close to INR 240, which is close to INR 12 per bag.
Sorry. There were no constraints in terms of availability of bag, and the cost of bag did not impact your cost at all.
I'm sorry. Can you repeat the last sentence, please?
I said the impact of unavailability of bags, which was also a concern in the fourth quarter of FY 2026.
I think we had serious issues of bags certainly in February, March, and then also in April and May. The problem in Q4 was huge demand. Problem in Q1 is not exactly demand, but also due to the fact that granule prices went up. We are a company which uses a lot of LPP bags, not LPP bags. Since we are indexed on LPP bag, the impact was much more. As we came to the month of June and now July, the Q1 , we had to give a lot of incentives to cover capacities, but that's kind of going away now. Due to certainly the incentives will go away because the overall demand for the industry itself will come down, and all the bag manufacturers won't be in a position to extract pricing fees.
Okay. Because eventually the impact of anything does not seem to be reflecting the cost. Very well-managed costs. Great set of numbers. Thank you so much.
Thank you.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Shravan Shah from Dolat Capital. Please go ahead.
Yeah. Sir, what was our blended share for 1Q, and you have mentioned in terms of the plant level pet coke share, but at a company level for 1Q, what was the pet coke share and the coal share?
Okay, 1Q, I told earlier, I'll repeat it again. Fuel million kcal, 4Q was 1.44, 1Q was 1.52. That's the overall fuel mix. When you go to pet coke, Q4 was 1.84 and Q1 came at 2.01.
Sir, I was asking more from a fuel mix perspective. What was the pet coke as a whole?
Okay. I'm sorry. I thought you were asking million kcal. Let me just give you the data. Pet coke, 4Q was 37%, 1Q, 27%, 10% reduction in the overall mix.
Coal share was how much in 1Q?
Coal was 53% in 4Q and 67% in 1Q. AFR was 10% in 4Q and 6% in 1Q.
Okay. Blended cement share in 1Q was 83%?
Yeah. Blending ratio is 82%. Give or take decimal, 82.
Okay.
Thank you.
Just one more, sir. Just to get up this Jojobera and Panagarh where we got the CTO. Both these 1 million ton will be starting in Q2 or Q3?
Look, it is available for me. Right now in monsoon period obviously demand will be there, this number will be useful for me in Q4 when my numbers will go up. I need to dispatch close to about 20,000 tonnes per day in Jojobera. If I have to do 20,000 tonnes per day in Jojobera, this 1 million tonne will help me, headroom will help me. Similarly, in Panagarh, we used to do about 7,000 odd tonnes per day. Our target is to go to 8,500 tonnes per day. These are the numbers which will come into play in Q4, and this increase in capacity in Jojobera and Panagarh will help me get this consistent 18,500 per day and 20,500 per day.
Okay. Thanks.
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we'll take that as the last question for today. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Bishnu Sharma for closing comments. Over to you.
Thank you for your questions and active participations today. We hope the discussion proved insightful and the IR team remains available for any post-call clarifications. As we come to the end, I want to leave you with a few thoughts. Our growth journey remains on track. The 2 million tonne Surat grinding unit inaugurated ahead of schedule, along with the upcoming Kutch plant expected to be operational in the near term, will significantly enhance our presence across Western India. At the same time, this will help us free up capacity at our Rajasthan plant, enabling us to further strengthen our position in the northern markets. We will continue to focus on delivering growth and internal levers, including geo mix optimization, cost optimization, and premiumization, which will underpin long-term value creation for our shareholders. Thank you once again for your trust and support.
We look forward to engaging with you again soon. Thank you, everyone.
Thank you, management team. On behalf of Nuvoco Vistas Corporation Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines.