Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to Schneider Electric Infrastructure Limited Q1 FY 2027 Result and Business Update Conference Call. As a reminder, all participant lines will be in the listen-only mode, and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during this conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star then zero on your touchtone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Harshit Kapadia from Elara Securities. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Thank you, Huda. Good morning, everyone. On behalf of Elara Securities, we welcome you all for the Q1 FY 2027 conference call of Schneider Electric Infrastructure Limited. I take this opportunity to welcome the management of Schneider Electric Infrastructure, represented by Mr. Udai Singh, Managing Director and CEO; Mr. Omkar Prasad, Chief Financial Officer; and Mr. Mohit Agarwal, Head of Investor Relations. We will begin the call with a brief overview by management followed by a Q&A session. I will now hand over the call to Mr. Singh for his opening remarks. Over to you, sir.
Management lines are on talk mode. Please proceed. Udai sir, Mohit sir.
Yeah. Thank you. Are you able to hear me?
Yes, sir. Please continue.
Thank you, Harshit, and good morning to all who have joined. I just wanted to take you to the presentation, which we had shared last week, and just wanted to take you along a few slides which we had shared. I would take you to page number two, wherein we are so proud to share with you that we have been ranked as number one as the most sustainable companies in the world, third year in a row. This something which actually we are extremely proud of and something which we very truly relate to being a sustainable company. Now, I would like to take you through the next slide, which enumerates our vision and the mission.
Our vision, as you know, stays as that we will lead the new digitalized energy world, offering our customers and partners the most innovative, connected products and solutions, which will be ready for the power distribution's elevated expectations. We do this by our balanced business models, superior quality, and efficient supply chains, which will keep our growth and profitability resilient and sustainable. What you would also notice at this point in time is that we have slightly modified our vision now, and we say that we are your energy technology partner, through which we electrify, automate, and digitalize every industry, business, and home, driving efficiency and sustainability for all. Taking you to the next slide, which is page four of your presentation, where we are seeing as to how the company has a macroeconomic outlook.
What we see is that India 2030 is inflicting on the new infrastructure cycle, where the macro outlook is strong. If you look at there are three basic pillars which we have tried to capture for you. One is the GDP forecast itself, which is expected to be anywhere between 6.5%- 7% for next four years. This is also being driven by two fundamental levers, which is the per capita GDP, which will grow, if not less, at least 1.5x by 2030, by taking it to about close to INR 4 lakh, is something which we expect the GDP to be at per capita level in 2030. Also very positive for the company, which is the per capita electricity consumption, which is going to be typically anywhere between 1,800 kW hour to 2,000 kWh by 2030.
This itself, just to give you a set of perspective, this was in 2014, was about 1,000 or less than 1,000 kWh . At the same time, there are certain headwinds which all of us are facing, and so is our company is also facing, is the devaluation of rupee, which has gone down. Also is about 8% is where the rupee has depreciated since the time we started this year. Also the commodity prices, if you notice, has actually also been going up. Copper, aluminum, steel, and the labor which we use actually has been going up, and we are trying to see as to how do we mitigate this.
We also would like to, at the same breath, would like to speak about while there is a near-term volatility, which we see, all of us are seeing, India long-term investment remains intact, which are primarily driven by four basic fundamental levers. One is electrification. When I say so, I am talking about these levers which are pertinent and relevant to the company. The basic electrification need, where we see that the non-fossil fuel is going from, say, 300- 500. That's the vision for the country, and the nation is going great here. What I would also like to call about, one typical example is the energy storage systems where today it is about 13 GWh , which is expected to be 200+ by 2030, is the number which we see.
Another topic which I think all of us are reading it every day is the data center, and the AI and the digitalization which the nation is actually embarking on. Data center capacities, as you know, is going to go up from 1.6 to about 8 GW by 2030, if not more. The e-com users, which the nation has been very vibrant about with the young population which we have, is going to be about 450 million by 2030. The digital economy itself would contribute typically about 20% as we see it by 2030. These are the ones which will propel more and more data centers being put up, and I am sure you must be reading many announcements which are coming in the news in recent times. These are all supporting and getting driven by this wave which we see here.
Another element is the urbanization, wherein I'm talking about just two things on the slide which you have. Is the EV penetration, which is expected to be about 30%, and we are today at about 8-ish. If you read in the papers, you read the auto story, you'll find that this is something which is going to go up, and this will bring in a lot of things which has to be made for the nation by us in terms of setting up the EV infrastructure to support this EV momentum. The second is the Vande Bharat train. Why I speak about it, because today we have about 160 trains which are plying in the nation, where government has actually plans of making it about 800.
This becomes important for us because we power these trains by our circuit breakers, that is what we make in the Kolkata plant. Another, the last element being is the Make in India drive, which you heard the honorable Prime Minister yesterday, is the focus which has also been coming on the Make in India initiative. That is the reason why a lot of people will start manufacturing in India itself, which will open up CapEx requirements, where the company can perhaps do well in leveraging those conditions which are going to be there. We are trying to see as to how all of us put together can make many things in India, for not only in India, for outside and exports. The goods export expected is supposed to be about $1 trillion by 2030.
Now, there are various schemes which I am sure you are aware of. A few we have written down here, which is supporting all these four levers which I spoke about. The schemes like the RDSS scheme, the Green Energy Corridors, the New Energy Policy, the VGF schemes for PES, the Inter-State Transmission System (ISTS) charges waiver, the DPDP Act, the National Data Centre Policy, which came out about six months ago, which you must have read. The IndiaAI Mission, the AI conclave, which we had in Delhi, Yashobhoomi in April. The railway CapEx, the high-speed rail, the FAME Scheme, the eDrive, and a lot on PLI schemes which are enabling this, especially the ISM, which is India Semiconductor Mission. Other rare earth corridors which the country has been able to establish. So in a nutshell, what does it mean?
It means four growth engines, which are driving demand for power infra and for us. Which means that more power requires smarter grids for better reliability, that is also another area where we will be able to position ourselves possibly. While we do this, what we are trying to do in the company itself is trying to finally leverage three strategic pillars for growth. One of them being technology leadership, which you must have read in the slide before, where I spoke about the new mission statement, where we want to be for our customers, a technology leader and partner. How do we differentiate ourselves in terms of in eyes of customer? There is a customer differentiation, where customer stays at the core. Our value add would be only how do we prove our services and solutions differently as perceived by customer.
Of course, staying cost competitive so that we can not only bring in those technological differentiators, but at the right cost so that we can make the company more profitable. I would request you to go to page six, where we are trying to share with you a few of the wins in the quarter which went by, especially on starting off with the high growth segments, which are semiconductors and data centers. If you look at, there are two wins which we have captured in this slide, where the left one is a win in the semiconductor area in one of the states in central India, where we have supplied transformers which are fully enabled with digital solutions. This is the largest front-end fab order which we have received from a customer, which is into this area. We speak about data centers.
Data center, again, if you look at the right slide, is the medium voltage panel transformer and automation devices and panels which we have supplied. This has come in from a data center customer, where he preferred us being we as a partner who are able to technologically differentiate what we are going to provide to them. At the same time, I would like you to go to next page, which is page seven, where we are trying to retain as to what strategically is good for the company. If you look at, we have actually put on three basic areas where we have worked. First being renewables, where we have supplied transformers in the solar segment, and this stays different because of the volume and the intricacy of the transformer which we have supplied.
The center one is a cement plant put up by one private entity here in India, wherein we have supplied, and this is one of those first ones which are in there, one of the prestigious slurry pipeline project where we are doing it. The third essentially is an airport in South India where we have supplied this SS6P RMU pilot, which is an outdoor first of its kind being done in the airport in India. If I take you on the page eight, which specifically speaks about our technological nuances is the differences, is the distill vents, where we are talking about, again, two segments. One of being energy and chemicals on the left and on the right being utilities. In energy and chemicals, we have supplied the integrated energy management system, which is very critical for strategically bundling our digital solutions to enhance reliability and the asset performance.
When I say asset performance, this is one of those differences which really customers do consider us favorably in terms of bringing the end-to-end life cycle of the product to the customer. On the right, the smart grid and transformer monitoring solutions. This is something which we have done as one of the attachments, if I may say so, which has gone in something which we had supplied earlier on, where customer came back to us asking us for the digital enhancement which the product might have for better visibility and better preventive maintenance and predictive maintenance. This is one of those successes which we would like to share with you, and we are very proud of. I will now go on to page number 10, which is, we speak about our company's ESG commitments, and you see six tiles here.
The top three is on CO2 emissions, which our four manufacturing sites have. We are at 100%. We are at 100% in electricity sourced from renewables for plant, including on-site solar and the ICP paper which we have bought. We are super safe. Zero workplace safe, zero recordable incidents in all the sites. The gender diversity which we have been working on is close to 20% of the workmen, which actually comprises of our woman colleagues we are reaching. I am very proud of actually sharing the fourth tile, which is on skill development. We have actually trained close to about 1,900 youths with the skills in state of Gujarat with our 16 skill development centers which we have made.
At the same time, we are also talking about rendering and supporting people in areas. We have established Anganwadis and PHC health centers, public health centers, where we have done close to about 220,000 beneficiaries is where we have been able to reach and help and support them through this community center electrification programs. The last tile, before I hand over my financial performance to my colleague, Omkar, is a CRISIL rating, where we have been awarded as a strong rated organization with a score of 60+ as 63 out of 100, just about three months ago in the quarter 20 25. I now would like and request Omkar to take you through the financial performance. Over to you, Omkar.
Thank you. Thank you, Udai. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for joining this call. I will begin with our quarterly performance and the key factors behind the results. I will start with the synopsis of the key highlights. I will start with the order. The order is what you see there here, the number is 915. The good part here, the 915 is the highest ever quarters we have booked order as in any of the quarter. While you see the growth year-over-year is 0.5%, but if you look at sequential quarter, its growth is in double digits. The sales is a soft start, as we say. We started from YoY is around close to 5% growth. But if you look at again sequential quarter, it is in double digits.
If you look at historically in our company, the linearity, the Q1 is average of in the same range where we do almost the soft start in the Q1. Very good news that we still have very strong backlog, which is growth is close to 33% and around INR 2,100 crore plus backlog we are entering into the Q2, which is a good thing. EBIT, I will give you the more clarity. It is lower than last year. The number is INR 32 crore. I will give a little more clarity in the next slide. The profitability and the PAT, there are no exceptions. I will move to the slide 13. The sales we talk about is a 5% more moderate growth as a Q1 and we see in historically linearity that, yes, it is the Q1 always a soft start happen after the financial year close.
Other income, there are no surprises, is very linear. Nothing to specifically call out. When I come to the gross margin, if you remember, we discussed this in our Q4 earning calls. This is the external factor where we have a Southeast Asia crisis, commodity inflations, this is impacting over the gross margin. Largely because the orders which we executed in Q1 is largely coming from last year, because the turnaround time of this order, it takes close to average of six months.
The person you are speaking with has put your call on hold. Please-
Hello?
Hello.
Yeah. I hope. Hello? Hello? Am I audible?
Yes, sir. Actually, Mohit sir's line got disconnected. Let me join him back.
Can I continue?
Yeah, sure.
Yeah, thank you. Gross margin, we see that the little bit dip, and it is as we said in the Q4 earning call, that the external impact continued. Definitely, we are taking a lot of internal actions. Udai also talk about we are taking more on the cost consistency and competitiveness on that. Actions have been taken up the company, and we will see how we can mitigate those things. However, still I want just to highlight that these are the certain things which are very external factor, specifically at the commodity market. When you look at the copper and transformer oil, which is something we buy, and then the pricings are not in our controls. That is on the gross margin.
When I talk about the fixed cost, employee cost, and other expenses, while you see the percentage increase is high, but it is a normal Q1 where we do normal salary increment and all cost inflations happen in the Q1. Just because the sales growth, we are at soft target, moderate at 5%. There is something in the Q1 has negative operating leverage, but for sure that is not going to be there, and you must have saw in the last year that it get even it out throughout the year. It is just because of linearity of the sales, you have a higher expenses, into the employee cost and other expenses.
In other expenses, what I also see is one factor of FX, because FX also contributed to certain more increase into the other expenses because certain recharges and certain the imports what we do, which is in USD, which has actually the value compared to the INR value has depreciated, and that will also impact from here in the other expense. Depreciation is in line as you all approved as a CapEx. Now we started having capitalization in Kolkata plant. The plant started operationalizing from the early this year, and the depreciation is hitting. Most probably the growth from that plant over the period, it will anyway get accelerated. Finance cost, no change. We have not taken any exceptional loan, but this is just a difference in accounting. When you look at the finance cost, the sequential quarter, no change.
But there was some accounting change in the last year Q1. There was a gain coming because of modification of the accounting fair value, and there was a gain sitting in the last year quarter. But in current year, it's normalized interest cost. There's no exceptional loan being called out here. So just want to highlight that this increase is just because of the non-cash accounting adjustment. We have a normal tax expenses, and then we have a total income, which is 1.9% versus in the Q1 because of the impact on the GM, and also we have a negative operating leverage which we'll try to catch up in the subsequent quarters. Now I just give it back to operator, just to your question to clarify it further. Thank you.
Should we begin with the question and answer session now?
Yes, please.
Okay. Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touchtone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press star and two. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Dhruv Rawani from Priceb ridge PMS. Please proceed.
Hello, sir. Good morning. My question is regarding the transmission CapEx. We know that the solar and the renewable share in the transmission or generation has gone up to more than 40%. There are challenges in terms of transmission, especially on the evacuation side. What all products and services, especially under our EcoStruxure platform, do we have? Can you just throw some more light and detail on that?
Well, Mr. Dhruv, good morning. The products which we have, as you know, are transformers. We have equipment which handle and distributes power up to 33 kV range. Then we have the control and relay panel, which also becomes an essential part of any power system, I would say, which we could go to any class of voltage. Especially what we do not have is transmission line conductors. We do not have transformers which we call as a high voltage transformer or extra high voltage transformers, which are 400 kV and above.
That really the transmission sector, if I may say so, is not the real work for us in the transmission space. But when we go in and speak with IPPs who are actually making the solar farms, we do a lot there. What we do essentially is the 33 kV air insulated and gas insulated switchgear, which means a substation. We do about the energy storage system, which is going to get mandated, where people have to have a 24 by 7 reliable supply. Energy storage systems, which are battery based. We also have a set of softwares which actually manage, give you visuals, and also enables you to control the power plant. These are the things which the company does. What the company do not do is the evacuating high voltage transformers, which is not in our product range.
Thank you, sir. Thank you for that clarification.
Thank you. A reminder to all participants, anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touchtone telephone. The next question is from the line of Sameer Thakur from Ambit. Please proceed.
Hi, thanks. Would it be fair to assume that the miss is largely driven by lack of operating leverage? If I compare QoQ rather than YoY The gross margins are largely flat if I compare QoQ. And growth in other expenses is almost 20% YoY. Is that mostly driven by FX or any other parts over there? That is the first one.
No, it is just. Thank you. Thank you, Sameer. This is largely because of operating, because our expenses, all the GSR, what we call this inflation cost salary, and other costly charges increase from 1st of April. So largely because of operating, it has started from Q1, and we will hopefully it get even out throughout the year.
Okay. The operating expenses, is that largely driven by FX or any other thing?
No, in operating costs, in other expenses, whatever the cost we deal with out of the country, we have a dent of the FX for sure. But also there is an incremental inflation and regular increase, which is approximately 8%-10%, that is also there. So it is a mix of both in other expenses.
Okay. Half of the quarter is over for Q2. So what are you seeing this quarter so far in this quarter?
Yeah. If you look at historically, when you look at the quarter-to-quarter growth, okay, the Q1 always been soft start. Okay. While the Q2 will be a forward-looking statements, we are not giving you the right thing, but the idea here that historically, we always do better than Q1.
Okay. Thank you. I know you are not giving any future statements, but given the backlog growth, what ballpark revenue you have in mind? Like any range or something we can expect this year?
I can take that question, Omkar. Thank you for raising this. The number which you see in this Q1 historically, that has been the case if you compare the other Q1s as well as terms of whatever we do typically for the full year. What we have done is, we also had some headwinds which impacted this quarter. What I would like to assure you, without giving any forward-looking numbers, is all the actions which are necessary and required for retaining and really doing well for the fiscal, we have already initiated. What we see is the underlying demand environment and opportunity pipe is healthy for us. The pricing actions in the market have been initiated. It will take some time to really solidify and have an impact.
What I can see is that we are seeing the forward-looking three quarters, including the one which half of which has gone by, is good for us.
Okay. Thank you for that. Just the last one from my side. If you can comment by end market, like what is the exposure we have in data center? I think, last time you highlighted that 10%-12% comes from data centers. I think backlog is again around the same range and power will be around 40%. If you can comment by end markets, if possible, that would be great.
What I can state here at this point is, more than one-fifth of what is coming is from this new emerging segment, is what we hold in our order back. That is what we are trying to do as to how do we really manage this mix and try to increase selectively and strategically this mix of orders coming in from the emerging segments, while staying our focus on the core, which stays.
Okay. Thank you. And that emerging would be data centers, semi, solar.
Yes. So emerging would be at this point in time would be data centers, would be semiconductors, because India is in a very rightful path in terms of semiconductor, the companies who are investing huge money supported by government's PLI. And we are engaging with them pretty fruitfully. Those would be the emerging segments. While solar we have been listening for five, six years, we are trying to see it is emerging, but it has already emerged a few years ago. We are trying to see as to how do we really make inroads and stay afloat there, and then bring in the really new emerging segments which we see today for the country, which are especially semiconductors and data centers.
Okay. And one more if I can squeeze in. In metals and mining, we see many companies are putting up CapEx, and the CapEx growth rate for FY 2027 looks pretty high for those companies, which are basically your customers. Are you seeing traction on that as well in metals?
Yes. Yes, we are seeing a traction. As I said, opportunities which are in front of us, that pipeline is healthy and which has got a good mix of metals and mining, the MM M segment as you call it.
Okay. Thank you. Thanks a lot. I will get back in the queue.
Thank you. A reminder to all participants, anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on their touch-tone telephone. The next question is from the line of Vinod from PhillipCapital. Please proceed.
Yeah. Thank you so much for the opportunity. You just mentioned in your opening remarks that FX contributed to the growth in the other expenses. If I have to look at Schneider as a whole, say, on a 12-month basis, how much is imports as part of our COGS?
It will be-- Thanks, Vinod. This will be in the range of 10%-15%, not more than that.
Okay. Is there a natural hedge against that in terms of exports? Exports would be a similar number?
Yes. When you talk about the FX currency, it gets naturally hedged because we do have export as well in the same range.
Okay. Thanks. The second question I had is, in your press release, you mentioned that while we understand the commodity headwind and the impact on margins, you also mentioned something about legacy orders. Schneider, as I understand, is a company with a book-to-bill of 0.5, 0.6. So effectively what you are executing today would be at best orders booked maybe 1 or 1.5 years back when pricing was pretty good. So why would these legacy orders impact margins in that sense? Can you clarify on what legacy orders means?
Okay. When we say legacy orders means the order which booked before December last year.
Okay.
All contracts has a price which we offer to the customer, is kind of the firm price.
Because their execution period was somewhere close to six months. When we have a customer firm price, then price of the raw material like copper, oil, and all the other costs has increased.
We unable to go back to customer and ask for the revisions. That's what we are talking about, that this is impacting. While some of the contract which we have a large execution period, we always embed the price variation clause with the customers. That's what we are trying to say, that wherever we can't contractually go back to the customer to revise the price or seek for the price revisions, that's impacting our GM.
If I divide your order inflows pre-December, it would be express contracts, and post-December, you'd have price variation clauses, and that will somewhere show up on the execution going forward. Is that a right way to look at it?
Yes and no, because as our internal policy said that we have taken corrective actions. We started putting mandatorily as a price variation clause into all the contract. But wherever we have a tender where the price variation itself it is not one of the asks, or even we cannot bid if condition is not there, specifically in different utilities. We cannot go and have revision in their tenders.
There again, what we are giving is a price again with a certain validity.
But I will say still we have a risk there. If there is a delay in execution of the projects of the end customer, we may have an impact in the GM again. While we have taken an action, we cannot enforce the price variation in all the government tender backed by UPC and others. We have a challenge there.
These legacy orders typically would be distribution order or DisCom order?
No, it is all mixed. Largely we can say more on power and gate segments. Yes.
Okay. Finally, on the DisCom CapEx, what kind of a CapEx run rate do you have internally for this year in terms of DisCom CapEx?
You are talking about the DisCom CapEx, our CapEx for the DisCom, is it?
No, not your CapEx. But basically the TAM that could be available in the distribution CapEx segment for you.
Yeah.
Yeah. I can take this question. Thank you, Vinod. I am sure you would have seen the CapEx which the company has embarked on. We have typically, in last few years, if I may say, we have actually taken on a CapEx of roughly about INR 500 crore in our three plants which we have.
The basic idea is how do we enhance our capacities, number one. Number two, how can we cut on the import which we do from other Schneider factories outside of India.
To answer your question, the items which we make and the products which we manufacture are not exactly for a specific segment. They serve to a specific segment. For example, power and grid, which you have asked, in a certain way. For example, secondary distribution equipment is mainly for power and grid.
We have been trying to see as to how do we bring up those capacities which can cater to power and grid, especially in the secondary distribution and also in the transformer range, if you have, which also particularly large amount goes in power distribution.
Now, we are in sync with the CapEx which government has been planning, especially RDSS's INR 300,000 crore which have been put.
We are trying to see as how do we leverage this by these items which we produce ourselves in our factories.
Now, at the same time, I think you very correctly asked because your question was how many orders were booked before December and what exposure do we have. We are a bit selective in terms of engaging ourselves in those strategic accounts wherein the site is clearly visible, the project cycle is known.
There are lesser ambiguity in terms of executional ease of the contract. If the TAM is, say, 10
we may decide to engage in only, say, number which is less than 10, depending on these distributions and the lenses which we apply on any available TAM.
Difficult to answer, but we are a bit choosy and selective depending on which all contracts we enter into.
Sure. What is the TAM likely for FY 2027? How much do you expect distribution companies to spend this year?
The distribution companies, if they spend INR 100, doesn't mean that INR 100 is open for us.
No, I understand.
If someone who is actually uplifting the underground substation, underground cabling, really, we do not get into that contract.
Okay. Then I guess
The entire RDSS scheme
It is primarily aimed at the reduction of AT&C losses. That has been the primary objective.
Correct.
Which is going to get fulfilled by basically two fundamental actions. One action is to strengthen the power distribution infrastructure, which means that either replacement or putting up new devices and products, or going in with more structured cabling of distribution networks. That's one part.
Second part is how to really discipline the distribution infrastructure. That's the second part.
The first part we supply. We don't undertake something which is underground cabling. We supply our equipment, which are technologically differentiated. In the second part, we get into where there's a grid modernization, in very layman terms, I would say. When someone is trying to modernize a grid or a distribution architecture, that is where we step in and we give our solution. So now, for example, if the TAM is 100, the 100 may perhaps pertain to any number which is, say, 10, 15, 20, 25, depending on the nature of the job with the state entities or the circle entity. So it is very difficult to actually speak about a number.
But we are there where we should be there strategically.
Sure. Just continuing on that, thoughts are, I think-
Sorry to interrupt you, Vinod sir, but can you please rejoin the queue?
Okay.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Jay Neg andhi from Ambit Capital. Please proceed.
Hi. Am I audible?
Yes, Jay.
Yes, sir.
Great. Thank you for the opportunity. My first question is that, last quarter, we had said that the order growth was tepid because of conscious decisions made by the management due to extreme volatility in commodities. This quarter we have posted a healthy order growth. I just wanted to understand how much of the order growth would be fresh for this quarter, and how much would be a spillover from the previous one?
See, this quarter we have done the highest order intake at INR 950. With a large prior of the same quarter, if you look at quarter-on-quarter. We are not tracking. We will not be able to see what should have been decided in the quarter, if it was March spillover to April. There is a typical thing which always happen. There is a cutover where the order or the contract moves into new quarter. That really is not impacting, because that is something which is leveraged out in each quarter. It is not that there is a great influence of time phasing in orders which happen. Sometimes it is, say, 15%, 20%, sometimes it is lesser. It is very hard to answer you on that, Jay, sir.
Okay, understood. My next question is that, would you be able to quantify the magnitude of price increases we have taken to mitigate the commodity inflation?
We have done very aptly whatever we had to do, sir, so that we are mitigating the impact of raw material intake. Because it depends on item to item. The impacts of raw material is different because the composition and the constituent of the product and the commodities are different. What we have done as a practice is trying to see as to how do we recover those inflations which we have seen in the product cost in various products.
Difficult to quantify, but we are trying to see whether that impact, how best it can be mitigated.
All right. My last question would be that how much of our current backlog would be guarded by price variation clauses? In the future, would we prefer taking orders where we get price variation clauses, or would it be decision on a case-to-case basis?
Okay. I think this question is good. So historically, I think we, given this heads-up that on price variation clause in the contract, it is in the range of 20%-25% or more than that, which are large execution cycles project, which is more than six months to one year, more than one year. Second, I think most of when we do tendering, the costing sheets are always replaced on the current cost sheets. Okay. I am not so sure when you say price revision. We do have the transactional, but most of the projects and equipment, we do costing on case basis on every tender, and accordingly the pricing gets revised nowaday every month. So when we do the costing, we consider always the latest price.
All right. Okay. That is it from my side. Thank you so much, and all the best.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Manish Goyal from Thinqwise Wealth Managers. Please proceed.
Yeah. Thank you so much and very good morning, sir. Continuing on the impact regarding the material cost, I would like to know, is there a change in your revenue mix between systems and transactional products and services, which could also have impacted your current quarter as well as maybe the similarly last quarter also we had seen an impact. That is the first question. Yeah.
Yeah. Not big mix change, but the one change what is happening, that emerging segments is coming with the higher scope, including installation and commissioning. So mere supply, we are also getting into the larger, the project execution cycle, where the mix is changing in terms of not supply. It is also coming with a more longer duration and execution period, including installation and commissioning. So this transactional mix, I think we are maintaining with the similar linear growth the way we expect. Nothing, but no much change in that.
Would it be possible to just give us a mix? Because ideally, couple of years back, we were expecting our transactional products and services contributions to increase. Somehow we do not have those data points, but maybe if you can give us where does it stand today, and within the order book also.
Yeah. We take your question. I think we can try to give you from next quarter, I think some clarity on this.
Okay. Also, when we talk about emerging segments, maybe some of this also I would relate this, that digitization has been improving under our EcoStruxure platform. Is it that, a lot of these new orders or the systems orders, what we would be getting would have a higher import content? Even GIS, probably I understand that we do not manufacture, it is not localized here. Some of these products like GIS, where there is probably higher imports, that would also have impacted your margin?
I think import content, as mentioned, I think before, we do have import content, and because of FX, it has impacted. Even the cost of the imported component cost also has increased because it is not only in India, everywhere cost and commodity has impacted. What I am buying it is, last year versus now, the actual cost also increased and the cost of import, which is FX also has INR depreciated. Both has impacted.
No, I appreciate that. Sir, I appreciate that. Where I am coming from is that, has the import content, the raw material, or the finished products, or has that content increased in your overall basket?
Not really. In fact, Veda can talk about more I4I, where we are focusing more on India for India and more indigenous inputs increase, but we are not increasing import dependencies.
Okay. On exports, sir, what would be our exports revenue contribution now? I would like to probably put it in the context where we have put up new facility and we were looking to probably also make it as an export-focused unit. Maybe if you can just give us a perspective, what is the current export revenue of the total revenues, and how do we see it going forward? Because for lot many MNCs operating in power equipment sector, we have seen that exports have now reached 25%-30% on consistent basis, both on the revenue contribution side and the export order book, sorry, overall order book. Would appreciate if you can give your thoughts on the export side.
Today, our export revenue is in the range of 10%-12% in the revenue. You know that the CapEx we invested in Kolkata largely will cater the export market, which is just starting. We are still at more on ramp-up stage. It will take some time to reach and accelerate the export growth.
Okay. But would you like to share any medium-term targets as to where we want to take this 10%, 12% to? With this new facility, with large CapEx, what we have done, how should we look at it over a period? Because that would provide a lot of natural hedge to us for going forward.
Yes, sir. I think we are not able to give you the number, and percentage will also vary depending on my overall growth. Okay? It is unfair to estimate in terms of percentage today. But I can assure you that in terms of the absolute value, it is there in the strategy when we include the CapEx in the Kolkata plant. It will increase for sure. But in terms of mix, because we are also going in the emerging segment and otherwise, that is difficult to tell you at this stage.
Okay. Last question on Vande Bharat. Would it be possible to-
Sorry to interrupt you, Mr. Goyal, but can you please rejoin the queue?
Okay. Thank you.
Thank you. A reminder to all participants, anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on the touch-tone telephone. The next question is from the line of Aditya Deora from Divishaa Investment. Please proceed.
Good morning, Udai sir and Omkar. My query is with respect to the expansion that we had announced previously. Is everything as per plan, or is there any change in the plans with respect to the target completion timeline?
Thank you, Aditya. Everything is well on track. I can assure you that the latest in all the discussion what we did with the board also, we updated the status. It is going on track.
We should have additional capacity available in the second half of this financial year with respect to the expansion?
Yes, Aditya, morning. Yes, this is Udai. We have multiple programs. I am sure you have seen them.
Yes.
The programs are in our medium voltage factory in Baroda, in transformer factory in Baroda, and the new plant which we are making in Kolkata. There are multiple capsules which we have actually embarked on in terms of CapEx inclusion, and they have a staggered completion timelines and a ramp-up plan. What Omkar was saying, that all of them, all those programs, are being tracked by the management, and they are well on track as we see today, and we don't see any hiccups coming on the way of their completion. The answer to your question is yes. Since it is going as per plan, there are many things which are going to happen in calendar year 2027. There are a few which is going to get over by 2028, and thereafter a ramp-up plan. It is all on track.
My second question pertains to the sticky inflation that we are watching or we are seeing with respect to the commodity prices. What is our plan to deal with it? Finally, we have taken some price hikes of late. Why weren't these price hikes taken maybe a quarter back or something like that, or taken when the prices were going up? Let me rephrase it. As compared to many of our competitors, our margins are a bit subdued over last two, three quarters. Why have we fallen back with respect to taking price hikes with respect to our competitors, maybe?
Aditya , to answer you, we have not delayed the price hike action. We have initiated the price hike action right at the time when we started witnessing it. That's the reason why I would not like to comment upon how the competition is doing and what they have been doing. From our side, we can assure you that since the time when we are pretty much advanced with our tools in the factory to really engage and quantify the cost increases which are being seen and are impacting our product manufacturing. We have been pretty much on time in terms of quantifying it and communicating it, and especially those standard products which we sell, which are covered by a price rise. We have been able to go and share with the marketplace on the right time.
We haven't delayed this action, if I may answer you one, number one.
Okay.
Number two is the fall in this quarter margin, as what Omkar has said, it is maybe more on the operating leverage. But there is and the RM impact which has happened. Which is, I would say that it is more on this quarter, and we have plans in place to overcome this, because we also anticipate, like you, that this condition and the tailwinds which we had will get muted and will get ironed out in coming times.
Fair enough. Thank you, sir. Thank you for the opportunity.
Thank you. A request to all participants, please restrict your question to one question per participant. The next question is from the line of Vinod from PhillipCapital. Please proceed.
Yeah. Thank you for the opportunity again. I think since you guys ended on digitalization in state DisComs. I think Schneider is one of few companies which is present across the entire chain, from the hardware to the automation to the software. But are you seeing tenders coming in that fashion or are tenders getting broken down into the substation separately, the automation tender separately? Are DisComs now giving integrated packages as well? Are you seeing that at the ground level?
Yeah, it is a mix which we witness.
There are two ways in which we deal it. If it is something where there is a pure digitalization package upliftment, upgradation of a facility, we undertake ourselves.
Okay.
If there is anything where we do not really add any value.
In terms of, as I was mentioning sometime before, where it is more of making a new substation and doing a civil work and then also putting an upgraded digital infrastructure there.
We do not undertake it directly at times, and is normally quoted by large EPC houses of the country who actually-
Okay.
are good in making civil infrastructure, where we support them in terms of the solutions and systems which we have around grid modernization.
Okay.
That's how we do it. There is no one way to actually address this upcoming need of India.
We really see as how the content is, and different states, as you have rightly put it, have different formats in which they try to get their requirement. Obviously, because the regions and the situation in which they are are different. And we decide, depending on the quantum of work, where we can really add some value to the partner or directly, we take a call depending on when the tender is signed, and we start engaging with the tender.
Sure. Yeah. Thank you so much. Thank you so much for that.
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Sameer Thakur from Ambit. Please proceed.
Hi. Thanks again. If I understand correctly, your tilt is more towards private utilities, and obviously you have some business in public as well. If I talk about particularly one large private customer who is putting up large CapEx in Mumbai, are you seeing any more inquiries in the pipeline and that should have more visibility on power and grid side?
Yeah. We do have because we see this, the utility which you are talking about, and especially on all the private players, well, not exactly private, has got some government over there inclusion as well. We are seeing this, we are seeing and we are witnessing this flow of inquiries, and that's the reason I said that we do see a good pipeline in front of us, and that's the reason why I am reasonably confident that we will deliver what we plan to do fiscal year.
Okay. So that is volume growth plus price increase as well. Or it is just driven by pricing or pricing plus volume. So we should expect growth on both the fronts, right?
You are right.
Thanks. One more question if I have. So comparing business of-
Sorry to interrupt you, Mr. Thakur. Sorry to interrupt you, Mr. Thakur, but due to time constraint, that was the last question for today. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Harshit Kapadia for closing comments. Over to you, sir.
Thanks, Huda. We would like to thank the Schneider Electric management team for giving us an opportunity to host this call. We would also like to thank all investors and analysts for joining this call. Any closing remarks, Schneider team, that you want to share with investors?
Yeah. Thank you, Harshit, and thank you all who actually took out time to join this call. On behalf of the company, what I would like to comment upon is that we are sitting in front of a good and healthy pipeline. We assume that the pricing action and the execution plans which we have, which has already been initiated, will make our way through. We also see that as we progress, these uncertainties will die down, and under the backdrop of the pipe which we have and the actions which we have initiated, I am confident that moving forward, the year which are balanced three quarters will be good for us. Thank you again for joining, and have a great day.
Thank you. On behalf of Elara Securities, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines. Thank you, everyone.