Good day. Welcome to Sona Comstar's conference call. At this moment, all participants are in the listen only mode. A question and answer session will be. Presentation concludes. At that time, you may click on the video question button below the media player to ask your questions. Please note that this conference is being recorded. Some of the statements made by the management team in today's conference call may be forward-looking in nature, and we request you to refer to the disclaimer in the earnings presentation for further details. The management will not be taking any specific customer-related questions or confirm or deny any customer names or relationships due to confidentiality reasons. Please refrain from naming any customers in your questions. I now hand the call over to Mr. Vivek Vikram Singh for his opening remarks and the presentation. Thank you. Over to you, sir.
Thank you, Aman, and hope everyone had a great new year. On behalf of Sona Comstar, I'd like to welcome all of you to the addition of a third pillar in our growth story, one of sensors and software. Now, as the automotive world moves into the future, it is becoming what we call EPIC. In the last couple of years, all of you must have read or at least heard extensively about chips. Well, another term for chips is in or IC. That is the same IC. In NOVELIC, it is the same IC, which is in another form in our view of the future of mobility.
We've called this term EPIC to capture all the four big shifts, which are electrification of the powertrain, personalization of the vehicle to match and suit driver preferences, the increasing intelligence of vehicles and the systems inside them, and lastly, the connectedness that makes all of this possible. The EPIC IC also stands for intelligent and connected, and that is the IC in NOVELIC, that it is novel, it is intelligent, it is connected. In this, I'd say, brave new world, that is coming, sensors and software will play an oversized role in the automotive. This realization has been there with us for a long while, but it really hit home when we were making our IMCM module, the integrated motor controller module for the intelligent suspension.
We realized is that just that single module in a vehicle required 2 million lines of code, which is about 5x the software that goes into an average space shuttle. That's not a very surprising thing. Modern car has around 100 million lines of code, where the more advanced ones can go up to 200 million. A fully autonomous vehicle will have more than 500 million lines of code. With this context in mind, we have embarked upon the next phase in our long-term strategy. Once again, we have been now listed for almost 18 months, and I wanna reiterate our purpose as a company. Why we exist as a company is to be one of the world's most respected and valuable auto technology companies. This is important to keep in mind with why we do the things we do.
There is a purpose. We're a company that's led by a purpose, that why is important to keep in mind when you look at any decision that we take. Our automotive industry, as all of you already know, has a technology mega trend called electrification. We expect that by 2035, EV penetration would be over 80% at least. On that trend, we acted early. We started our journey on electrification in 2016. That has allowed us to take a leadership position in the global driveline space as well as the Indian motor space. Today, a new technology is emerging, which is one of increasing autonomy and intelligence of vehicles and systems within these vehicles.
In the same Sona Comstar spirit of moving not where the ball is today, but where the ball will be in the future, we are taking a meaningful step in the direction of electrified autonomous vehicle or EAV with the NOVELIC acquisition. Building an autonomous vehicle in simple terms is a matter of replacing with machinery the three things that humans need to drive: the hands and feet that operate the controls, the senses that perceive their surroundings, and the brain that turns the data into decisions. The first bit is mostly mechanical and electrical. The second one, the one of perception, is achieved through sensors, whether they be camera, lidar or radar sensors. The third, the intelligence to turn this input data into decisions is software. Software plus an iteratively learning general intelligence or in simpler terms, AI.
This is what is driving autonomous. What this does and what NOVELIC helps us is in adding the second and third set of capabilities of semiconductor chip design, of radar sensors, software and MLAI tools to add to what we already have in mechanical, electrical and electronic abilities. This would help us to start building the third business vertical of sensors and software. Why NOVELIC specifically? We have five compelling reasons for this. One. Extremely few companies share our DNA of being high technology, high growth and very high profit. I mean, their 27% net profit margin is rare. When we saw that NOVELIC has achieved all three of these without any external funding ever, metaphorically speaking, at least it was love at first sight.
Second, we've done a lot of research in the last six months to validate the hypothesis that radar sensors are the best technology to solve the in-cabin sensing problem. We'll speak more about this and why best. As I said repeatedly, best is not just high performance. It is high performance. It is high performance and low cost, and importantly, with zero invasion of passenger privacy. Third, which is very, very important to us and very close to our heart, and it is also a fact that most M&As fail mostly due to cultural integration issues. With NOVELIC, although, I mean, if you can see them on your screen, and you will later, they may not look like us, totally, but culturally we are very, very similar with shared middle class values of integrity and frugality and respect for money.
They're also committed to vitality and agility in innovation and engineering excellence. Fourth, this one is a slightly technical one, that this is one of the rare vertically integrated companies in this field with capabilities spanning the entire gamut from chip and sensor design to signal processing software. Very rare to have the whole capability set at one place. Last but not the least, out of it. We expect this deal to be EPS accretive from the first year itself, while providing us the opportunity to grow this into another $100 million vertical in the next six to seven years. We'll talk about each of these details in the next few slides. First, the market. Because of increasing autonomy and intelligence in vehicles and vehicular systems, more and more perception is required.
This perception is achieved through sensors, as you can see on your screen, whether they be camera, lidar or radar. According to McKinsey, increasing adoption of ADAS and autonomous or semi-autonomous driving will propel this ADAS sensor market to $43 billion by 2030, which is a 3x jump in the next seven to eight years. Today, most ADAS applications are solved by single sensor solutions. As autonomy advances, this can only be achieved through a multi-sensory approach and sensor fusion, which means a combination of camera, radar or lidar and the ability to integrate it. Today, there are very few companies globally that have innovative single sensor solutions, let alone having multi-sensor. No one company actually today is working on all three types. NOVELIC is very proficient in radar technologies and can offer sensor fusion algorithms to its customers.
In addition to its technology prowess, NOVELIC is unique in its approach to high profitability and sustainable growth. It has been profitable every single year since its inception. It's grown revenues at a phenomenal 53% stagger over the last 10 years. All of this without ever raising any external equity capital. There is a lot I admire in these three gentlemen that I may not have told them personally, but I'm telling them publicly that the journey they have taken is inspirational to us in many ways. They're so much like Sona in how we value money, technology and growth, that I mean, this is only our second acquisition in eight years. It goes that we look very hard and we are very selective, but when we do find someone, it is someone very, very aligned with us.
Together with NOVELIC, we are going to be one of the very few companies in the world to have a large and growing revenue share from the twin automotive megatrends of electrification and autonomy, while achieving and maintaining a high growth and remarkable financial performance in terms of profit and return on capital. Now I'll hand over to our Group CTO, Mr. Deshmukh, to talk more about the technology and its application. Mr. Deshmukh, sir.
Thank you, Vivek. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Radar will play a significant role in ADAS world. Radars can detect distance and speed of other vehicles on the road, obstacles in the car's path, the position of the car relative to the road and other vehicles in the car's blind spots. Many ADAS functionality, such as adaptive cruise control, automatic emergency braking, lane keeping assistance, and autonomous driving cannot be performed cost effectively without ADAS. Another critical application of radar technology is in-cabin sensing. Children and pets left behind in locked cars have resulted in thousands of deaths worldwide due to heatstroke. In new car models, government regulations and car safety assessment guidelines mandate child presence detection or what's called CPD. Euro NCAP, 2023 requires CPD for a five-star rating.
Major OEMs have joined hands and have announced that they will provide CPD on their own in their cars. NOVELIC radar technology detects life presence, child presence, and seat occupancy through vital signs such as heart rate and respiration sensing. The technology works under any lighting conditions, including behind the car seats and even in the car's seat well. Moreover, as we have mentioned, the sensing happens anonymously, so there can be no privacy concerns like those in sensing by cameras. In short, NOVELIC millimeter wave radar technology is the best solution for in-cabin sensing. The in-car sensing that NOVELIC technology makes possible can also be used for other applications, such as optimized deployment of airbags and other safety systems, driver monitoring through the signs of drowsy or distracted drives, or gesture control infotainment machine interface. Let's look at this technology through a video.
Seen a glimpse of NOVELIC's technology. Let me introduce you to the three cofounders of NOVELIC who are behind this innovation. Darko, who is the CEO. Veljko, who is the CTO. Veselin, who is the Chief Sales Officer. With that, I hand over to Veljko to talk about their innovation and tech capabilities. Over to you.
Thank you, Mr. Deshmukh. Hello, everyone. This is a very exciting moment for us and the whole NOVELIC team. We are happy to be here today. Well, I think Vivek and Mr. Deshmukh have given quite good top overview of our technology, and I'm actually happy to see how quickly Sona team understood NOVELIC's story. I hope also that the video was helpful to everyone that was joined today to get better understanding. I'm not gonna talk about technology purely, but also about our story from our perspective a bit. Veselin, Darko and I, we have been working together for the last almost 16 years. For the last 10 years, we put all our working energy and our time in a company we founded together with our amazing team.
We are engineers by background, specialized in millimeter wave systems algorithms and systems on chip. NOVELIC was founded with clear mission to develop end-to-end capabilities in millimeter wave radar sensors and also to commercialize it through various product lines in different industries wherever possible. With major focus on automotive. We built our know-how step by step, experiment by experiment, project by project. Our specialty is short range radar and applications requiring miniature hardware and smartly engineered embedded software, such as in-cabin radar, parking radar, collision avoidance, side/rear radars, guiding and docking radars, et cetera. Those examples you could have seen on the video. We started as a team of five. Today we are over 160 people, with 130 engineers, 10 of which Ph.D.s, who are developing product platforms in several European developing centers.
Like Vivek mentioned, although we have been working with a capital intensive technology, we have managed to develop that technology in an organic way. We engaged from day one with customers. We provided them short-term value while also trying to identify long-term roadmaps and how our radar technology can fit in those roadmaps in three, four, five years. On that journey, we generated revenue and profits with continuous growth year- on- year and used that profits to reinvest. Now, for moving to the next phase of our growth, we wanted to have a strategic partner. A strategic partner in a real sense of that meaning. The partner with the same commitment to innovation and technology like we are. The partner who supports us in scaling up our business and who gives us the freedom to innovate further.
To be fair, when we met Sona Comstar team, we knew that this was the one. We immediately felt great alignment on the core values, and those are the main in green in the presentation. Together with Sona Comstar, with access to their customer base and marketing support, we believe that we can grow NOVELIC exponentially and become a significant player in the global market of autonomous mobility and automation in broader sense. Now on the next slide, let me briefly explain the new ecosystem being built in automotive world and NOVELIC's capabilities across the value chain. First, the value chain itself is changing and transforming. It's transforming from traditional hierarchy of tiers to hierarchy combined with the need for much more collaboration and orientation to domains of competencies. That happens in both mega trends of automotive industry, in electrification and also in autonomous driving.
We are preparing NOVELIC for that shift. Basically, what our now big brother, Sona Comstar, did in the electrification domain, we are going to do in the autonomous driving domain. In our case, this means that we would keep integrating and improving all subsystems of other sensors we developed. Here we speak about electronic boards, antennas, embedded software, application software, or machine learning. On our supply chain, due to our modular and chip agnostic system, we can partner with all leading chip suppliers. Actually we want to combine modularity of independent subsystems with vertical integration. We believe that this approach, in combination with changed value chain ecosystem, will give us potential to deliver to and collaborate with basically all tiers. With OEMs, with tier ones, with tier twos, with autonomous driving integrators, with anyone. Depending on the context and customer's demand, we can supply what they need.
That can be hardware, software, or the fully integrated autonomous driving subsystem. This will give us resilience, and we consider it one of our biggest strengths in the times that are coming for autonomous industry. I'll now hand over to Rohit to tell you more about the transaction. Thank you.
Thank you, Veljko. Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. Let me now walk you through the structure and the key financial parameters of the transaction. We have structured the transaction in a way that it's a win-win for the both Sona as well as NOVELIC. Sona will be buying 54% equity in the company for forty and a half million euros through a combination of primary and secondary route. This will mean that NOVELIC founders will continue to contribute and participate in its growth story in a meaningful way. At the mentioned consideration, NOVELIC is valued at a pre-money EV of sixty-four and a half million euros and post-money valuation of EUR 75 million. It puts the implied valuation at 26x the estimated PAT for the calendar year 2022, which also happens to be the financial year for NOVELIC.
Purchase consideration will be discharged in three installments, with 60% to be paid out at the transaction closing and the balance 40% in two equal installments, each at the end of 12 and 24 months from the date of closing. The transaction will be funded primarily from Sona's existing resources, and we expect it to be closed by end of March. We expect the transaction to be EPS accretive for Sona from the first year itself. This brings us to the end of our presentation, and I'll now hand the proceedings back to the Chorus team for Q&A. Thank you.
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who has a question may click on the video question button below the media player to ask an audio question. When your name is announced, you will receive a pop-up on your screen. Choose the option Join as Panelist, accept the prompt, unmute your audio/video, and proceed with your question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a minute while the question queue assembles. Ladies and gentlemen, to ask a question, click on the video question button below the media player. While we wait for the queue to assemble, we have our first text question that is received from Chirag Jain from Catamaran. The question is: Based on the press release and the presentation, it seems NOVELIC's key solution is in in-cabin sensing.
Is NOVELIC's solution also being built for the core autonomous driving? If yes, what is the vehicle today, and what can it increase to?
I kind of expected this because this is. NOVELIC team, apologies, but this is one of the key questions that you get in India as you're listed. Content per vehicle is somehow a term that is used. Chirag, it is more about the capability that is there. The applications are immense. I will request Veljko to talk a little bit about the applications because, and I think that's why Veljko tried to form for you the pyramid, that it's changing so much, that who provides what kind of content in a system and what is the shape of that final system is very different. I think that question of content per vehicle is very rooted to the world that we showed, the tier one, tier two OEM world. Here, NOVELIC has the ability and already does provide service to all four levels.
The customer could be a chip designer itself, it could be a global tier one, it could be the OEM, and it could become mobility solution providers. People like Waymo, Uber, who are providing you the final autonomous solution. All four of these categories are already customers and will continue to be. However, the framework that one uses to ask question will be different in this world. Veljko, you can talk more about what other solutions this capability set can be used for, but for everybody on the call, it is this. It is radar sensing and then processing that perception when it comes back, processing that for meaningful decisions. That's the capability in very simple terms. Veljko, please.
Okay. When we speak about in-cabin solution, we speak about a completely new application in the automotive. This roadmap was defined pretty recently. We were working on that since the beginning. Since our inception, we knew that this application will be on the road of new vehicles, and we build the technology for that. The roadmaps like we could have seen of one of our previous slides are starting the production of that sensor. That is mandated by regulatory bodies from 2024, 2025 onward. All OEMs will have to be ready for that solution.
Radar is actually has proven over the years of competition of on the technological level and stories among, let's say regulatory bodies, et cetera, as the most suitable choice here. The best product market fit. We as the company are now ahead of the market regarding the maturity of the solution that we are preparing and regarding the also its cost side, which is not not negligible in while partnering with with with our chip suppliers. We have the tiny software to resolve several critical applications. When we speak about regarding the content, we speak about applications which are mandatory, which we will have to provide, actually, which OEMs will need to have as the functions for five-star safety. This is the child presence detection.
We also speak here about add-on functions that we built by smartly engineering the software, which are the seat occupancy detection, so detecting the occupied seat and therefore replacing the current technology which is existing there, which is actually basically the cables and sensors put in the seat. By using radar, we can get rid of those existing sensors and basically get the new product at a very little cost. Also, in addition to seat occupancy, we speak about intrusion and proximity alert, when basically in one sensor we will also have the alarm function completely integrated in serial production. This is for the generation 1 of the products. Child presence detection, seat occupancy and intrusion alert.
These are the features on all roadmaps of all OEMs. Of course, we are not sitting still knowing already what can happen in the generation 2, the work is being done on also on more advanced features.
May I add to what Veljko said, and to give an analogy that I think maybe everyone is familiar with. To say content per vehicle in a software driven world is trying to, let's say, how much does SAP cost or how much does Microsoft cost per machine? It's a very hard question. It depends on the optionality and modularity that you choose. If you choose just one function, Veljko just told you about three, it could be one. How many features do you wanna add depends on each provider, and it will be a choice between the OEM and between the tier one and the chip designer. Similar thing, if you had asked us in 2017 that what is the content per vehicle of a driveline in an electric vehicle, we wouldn't be able to answer you.
We are trying to do things which are at the cutting edge of what is available in the world today. To be the best, you have to be that person, because. That's a classic innovator's dilemma, okay? To how much is the addressable market, and you think about what was asked to IBM in 1980s, that how many computers do you think you can sell? Closer to our industry, what was asked to Mr. Jellinek and Daimler when the car industry started, that how many cars do you think you can sell? The question, I don't think it's the right question at this moment. The track record is there. The growth record is there. Like we said, we are going to grow very strongly and profitably.
I don't think these subtleties or model-making devices like content per vehicle need to fit in. Trust me, within 10 years you'll realize that that's not the question anymore. Veljko, I think, another request because he said about general autonomy. I think, how radar perception can be used for enabling autonomous vehicle in its mobility function. That I think you should also address.
Yes. When we speak about, autonomous driving, so basically we have two worlds. One is inside of the cabin and one is the outside. Most of the attention is focused on the outside now. Our solution was focused on inside of the cabin, so detecting what happens inside. I mean, one of our product lines. We do develop the other product lines which are also based on the same radar technology, which resolve the exterior functions. Some of them are also already mandatory. Some of them on the roadmaps. Every of them basically, on the big roadmap of having fully autonomous vehicles.
Radar is the inevitable sensor that must be used if we want to have to achieve full autonomous driving. In the exterior world, we are focused on what we call the short range detection. Let's say vicinity of the vehicle, so around the vehicle to allow what we call low speed autonomous driving functions, such as helping with parking, such as emergency brake in city drive, such as detecting the pedestrians, and also providing not only that, but interaction between the car. The people approaching or the passengers while detecting the gestures and other commands to unlock the car or protect the doors of the car. This is where we are focused today.
Thank you. Thank you, Veljko. Darko or Veselin, if you wanna add anything on ASPER as a product or how ASPER helps autonomy, please speak to it.
Hi, all. We are speaking about automotive, but we should have actually much broader specter of the observation. The needs are and what is our technologies doing is addressing mobility world. Mobility is not only pure passenger vehicles. These are also transportation vehicles we already have in today. There are agriculture vehicle, construction vehicles, miner vehicles. This is also vehicles who have two wheels or three wheels. All of them will come and need to merge with new technologies together. The advantage of another approach, which is not purely automotive, is that the deployment of technology potentially little bit faster considering automotive design process and deployment of the technology.
Our ASPER platform can offer, typically, protection from potential collisions which are coming for the back, like a rear radar observation. Also, transportation vehicles, and also for two and three vehicles as well as a lateral protection. In many cases in automotive world, people are addressing only corner type of the radars and front radars. We are addressing rear radars and lateral radars. The main also difference between our approach and other approaches is that the lot of intelligence and signal processing is done on the module itself. That means that ASPER type of products can be used for the aftermarket approach and also approach where such a called ECU unit or processing unit like we have in classic automotive vehicles is not existing.
That means that we strongly believe that our technology will be deeply employed in transportation vehicles, like heavy vehicles and also will be deployed in vehicles, like motorcycles, like e-bikes, where actually the size matters, where processing power matters and power consumption matters.
Thank you, Veselin. That was actually. Yeah, we missed that point. That is much broader than what is currently called automotive. We can move on to the next question, but every one of you who's here, you're invited, and please do visit our stall at the Auto Expo. You will get to see the technology live and in action. The demonstrator that some of you saw in the video would be there. I think it's landed in India today. You will also meet these three gentlemen and their teams, and you will also see the other perception applications of radar at our stall. Please do come. Seeing is much better than seeing on a video or a slide. Please try and come to our show.
Thank you. We invite our next questioner. That is from the line of Kapil Singh from Nomura. The quest prompt on your screen. Unmute your audio, video and proceed with your question.
Kapil, request to please unmute your audio and then proceed.
Yeah. Hi. Thanks and good evening. Vivek, first of all, congratulations for embarking on a new journey for third dimension of growth really. Look forward to all the developments here and to the entire Sona Comstar as well as the NOVELIC team. I'll start with the NOVELIC team first. You know, as somebody who's on the outside, you know, what I would like to understand first is, you know, you are a profitable high growth kind of a company. And you've never raised capital as well. When you look at this transaction, obviously, you're looking at something very strategic that comes to your table.
I heard you talk about, you know, the strategic fit, but if you could also share some of, you know, some one or two examples of what you think, you know, for example, Sona, brings to the table from your perspective?
Yeah. Darko, Veselin, Veljko, anybody wants to answer that, please go ahead. I'm not gonna help you with this question. This is just for you guys.
Maybe I can start, and then we can all add on. For us, we see a very, very serious company with a high, high technology focus. The company that was built on the innovation and that was able to commercialize its innovation on the market. Which built, let's say, the spirit and the culture for that. This is not something that you can build very quickly or you miss some steps. Basically, you see that by doing conversations, by moving on in checking whether you have alignment. This was the most important aspect from the beginning. We see that, we will...
we can and will be mentored on our journey to grow NOVELIC in a very similar way, just on the, let's say, another technological field. Like I said on my slide, we want to do in the world of ADAS sensors and autonomous driving, what Sona already achieved in another field. What is important for us is that they will give us the support, but they will give us also the freedom to operate. They believe in us. They will believe what we have built is on the health, healthy, let's say pillars, and that we could execute. We think this is important in these kind of deals that, you know, you keep the momentum.
You keep the momentum of your vision because it will take some time until, you know, we really align on all details. We are sure we will. By that time, we feel that we will get the freedom to operate and to build the NOVELIC like we envisioned. I don't know if Darko and Veselin can add. Darko, maybe you.
Yes. I would like to add. It's, I think, we get the experience, if I may summarize, guidelines and, we can be teached also by Sona how to become the big company. We see it as a big brother, you know, and go also not just the that capital investment, but also the, you know, like having a teacher who can provide us and lead us to this success. If I may summarize, in a short, sentence.
I will add only one sentence. What we really respect with Sona is dynamic. Dynamic movement. We are facing that all automotive world is dramatically changing. You have the new OEMs approaching fast. We have the old OEMs was still slower and try to adapt. In a world of Tier One worlds where the Sona is, because we engage with a lot of Tier Ones as a customer, as our customers, you see that their organization matters are very old-fashioned, which cannot allow them to act fast and to move. They are not inventing, they are reacting on the needs for OEMs. You need to predict what OEMs will need. You need to engage with OEMs in the early stage.
You need to invest in relationship with OEMs to understand their need before they are raising RFQs. This dynamic is something which we'd like to follow up together with Sona. We recognize this as a huge Sona asset advantage.
Yeah. Thank you. One question is on just the growth opportunity. You know, how should we think about it going ahead for this business? Is it a manufacturing capacity kind of driven business where we need to make investment? What is the investment plan in next, let's say two, three years? What is the capacity utilization, if that is a relevant metric? There was also a mention of actual potential to or option to acquire a chip designing company, I believe. If you could just touch upon that as well.
Darko can take that one, but, it's not potential to acquire. We have a chip design company already.
Okay. The transaction scope also includes acquisition of NIRSEN, yeah.
It is a company owned by the NOVELIC founders in the same proportion. This, as part of the transaction, NIRSEN will be acquired by NOVELIC as a form of having the full integration going from chip designs and putting the software on that, like the sensors and then the software. The one thing I'd like to add, and thank you guys for all the love, but also getting to mass manufacturing in millions takes a bit of experience. That's something we can bring. Everything else they can do independently, and they don't require us as much. Yes, we are always there to mentor and guide, but they already have all of that. Yes, going from a few thousand to a few million is not a journey that is.
I mean, if you do it first time, it's much harder and longer. You go together, it's bit easier, and we've been there. That's, that's a good advantage to have in that space. The second part, Darko, you can talk about that also, what Kapil asked.
Regarding the first focus of the growth is definitely in the technology you have seen on the video. As Vivek already mentioned, this is mandatory in-cab for OE, car OEMs to have it in order to get this safety stars and safety points. Also on our roadmap is this something that we are pushing to be focused on our investment. We are in this field for a long time. We know the technology. We have also a lot of patents there. It seems for us the first, let's say, success as the in-cabin that we mentioned on the video.
Kapil, because you also cover tech, so that'll be easier for you to understand. A lot of it, the investment is people, because you're writing code. How many lines of code is basically the functionality. The board you're not gonna manufacture anyway, right? That comes. The chip is also. It's chip design. You're gonna get the software part. It's just the manufacturing of just the sensor bits. That's the only bit that is there. Capacity is a derivative of people. We are putting in primary so that the first three-year business plan is going to be self-funded after that primary. Beyond that should. Right now doesn't look like. When I said $100 million, the money is already there. I hope that this $100 million happen much earlier. I hope then we need more money to do something bigger.
Like we have, as you should have seen with Sona. I mean, if you say how much would the CapEx that we have previously outlined last time we spoke, which was $120 million, right? $120 million, yeah, is enough to service what was our order book till the end of last quarter. Next quarter's order book will increase, and hence funding increases. Yeah, we're feeling good with, I would say, capital deployment, capital allocation and capital usage. Like I said, and this you'd also appreciate. It's a very middle-class strong value on how to take every INR, every EUR and extend the maximum use out of it while not sacrificing our technology goals. It is extremely rare. That's, that's why, I mean, we've, we're quite concerned since 2018.
For four and a half years we haven't done anything is because we rarely meet somebody like that. If you meet really high tech, high growth companies, then you have to talk about cash burn and all, and We are not the people who can digest cash burn. We don't have that in our system, right? You meet people who only talk about things like, "Yes, this content per vehicle, 10 INR per vehicle, so many vehicles, this multiply, give me 8x multiple." Those, why should I do something that I can buy the equipment and do it myself? If you're not gaining any capability, if you're not adding anything to yourself as an organization, as a human being, what are you doing? We are trying to make technology that the world looks to us for. This is why I started with our purpose.
It is never purely financial, but it has to be financially sound. Finance is the second part of it, but it has to be highly profitable and able to stand on its feet. This transaction that we've envisioned and the business plan that we've drawn out together, that funding's there, we should be able to, on our own steam, get to... Like I said, the $100 million target is because we all joke about it, but that's the time we will become a real company, right? That's the goal, then we see how we take it from there and how quickly.
Sure. Look forward to that. Just one clarification. This $100 million includes what all? Does it include in-cabin technology only, or what all does it include?
ACAM per, am I missing something, Darko? ACAM is the short form for in-cabin. I don't know. You guys can tell. Darko, Veljko can explain. ASPER is the sensory perception one. Plus, we have IoT products also. Darko?
Yes.
In INR 100 million, what would be the breakup like?
It's more a question for Veselin, I think it is.
We will have a two different main approaches, one a little bit smaller. The direction is that we are hoping that we are approximately equally strong having the ASPER type of the platform, and from other side, inside of the cabin platform. They will be the main pillars of that what we expecting as a revenue stream. You need to understand then that we have in a space of the sensors, you're speaking in defining smart commodity hardware. If you have smart commodity hardware, after that you can bring up new functionality considering machine learning, new functionality considering new applications who are actually like a software. This software content together with hardware will make a difference.
The value for the customer will be not necessarily. Actually, you will have a smart sensors which we are going to develop. In our roadmap, all type of platforms, the basic platforms which we are designing for the hardware point of view, will be encased by comprehensive software updates of the for the different application which will come constantly. We are expecting that in this area, we will having two major platforms, a lot of family of different products for different type of concrete applications, covering complete mobility. We are starting a advantage like detecting a people.
Detecting people means you can detect people inside of the vehicle, you can detect people outside of the vehicle, you can detect the people also in a industrial environment. All those things are there. As said, we are focusing at the moment to mobility solution, where automotive itself, passenger vehicle is one part of the story, and the second part of story is the rest of the applications in construction, the transportation, two and three vehicles.
To cover in short, ACAM, cabin sensing, ASPER, which is sensory perception, which is outside the vehicle. These are the big two from product side. There will be engineering services and licensing. There is a lot of licensing income that we get because there are customers who wanna deploy on their own. They just want you to design and give them the sensor software. You get paid for as many units they sell. These are the three revenue streams. Licensing currently, a large part of it is licensing. There, trust me, if you can think of any major European OEM, it is already there. Yeah, that will also continue. However, over time, ACAM will be the biggest revenue stream, ASPER second biggest, and licensing and software services as the third revenue stream.
Thank you. I have a lot of questions, but will come back in the queue.
Yeah, the thing is, in this changing world, you know, where the product versus service or product versus solution, actually it is solution now. The solution could be a piece of hardware, or it could be a few lines of code. Now, you don't manufacture lines of code. You gotta do it together. I mean, if you have come to our Chennai plant and you've seen our IMCM, what does it look? It's just a board with a lot of electronics. You would wonder why is it so expensive? It's because of the millions of lines of code that go into it. I mean, like somebody asked me once that what is the weight? Like, how would that matter?
I think we all, and hopefully, as people understand us as a company more, and I hope we can do that job, we sometimes are not that good at it. We can also have people realize that it is a very fast-changing world. In a car that has, you know, 100 million-200 million lines of code, the old way of how much does it weigh and how much is value addition, those days are going, and very fast. Let's see how well we communicate this. That's always been a challenge, especially in India, right? I mean, I think it would be easier to communicate this in San Francisco or Israel or Stuttgart, but in India it gets a little difficult because we are also used to what we see around us.
That still perhaps is a little behind where global mobility has already moved.
Sure. Thank you.
Thank you.
We move to our next question that is from the line of Hitesh Goel from CLSA. Request you to please accept the prompt on your screen. Join us panel and proceed with your question.
Hi everyone. Hello, Vivek, Rohit and Sona team and also the NOVELIC team, and congratulations for the great deal. I just wanted to understand, you know, I missed that structure part on the transaction. First, can you please explain that, you know, is it a, you know, as founder then how much going into the company if you can explain that. I also-
Hitesh, I'm sorry to interrupt. May I request you please speak a bit loud?
Yeah. Can you hear me now? Can you hear me?
Much better.
Yeah. I just want to understand the, you know, the structure, the, of, you know, how much is there a stake sale of founders in this transaction? How much or how much is going to the company? Then EV, EUR 64.5 million. There is around EUR 24, EUR 23.5 million debt, right? In the company. Just wanted to understand the structure, because I missed it.
I'll clarify. Post-money valuation is EUR 75 million. Okay? Sona will be acquiring 54% stake as a mix of primary and secondary. What Sona will pay out would be EUR 40 and a half million as total consideration. The payout is has a staggered sort of cash outflow. 60% on closing and then 20% each at the end of 12 and 24 months respectively.
Okay. Is there a debt in the company or it's totally?
No. No, no, it's near to zero, I'll say.
Okay, my second question would be, you know, can we understand it much better, you know, the background of the promoters of NOVELIC before starting NOVELIC? Just want to understand have they worked with, you know, which companies so that, you know, we can understand some relationships.
Sure. First of all, hi Hitesh, I haven't seen your face for like kind of 1.5 years. Hi.
Yeah.
Darko, Veselin, who wants to take this one?
I will take. Tell us couple of words. The company, NOVELIC, just celebrated 10 university recently. Generally, the core team, that means three of us, we can be working together previously in a German-based D2 company in Stuttgart. We were actually delivering solutions to Tier 1 companies in Germany. We were working together in this area for more than, I would like to say, I think seven years before. That means we are working quite long time together. This was very important because it's not easy to make an innovative company which also brings the money. It's not easy to make innovative company can understand how to make a product. This is essential thing.
In order to have this, we have experience how to make a product. This is basic. The classical startup has excellent ideas. Maybe they can have like a prototype, but doesn't know to make a product. That means, in this parallel world, you need to build other competencies to deliver maturity of the product and also to bring up the new ideas in front. I think we managed to do it through our long experience in work in this area.
Okay.
Darko, t hat was a short time.
Yeah.
Veselin was their boss, Darko's and Veljko , and he hired them. The three of them came back from Germany. Actually, if you understand a little bit about the European structure, a lot of people, the bright people from Serbia had to go and work in, you know, Western European countries like Germany. It happened in India as well, right? Like a lot of our brighter engineers went to the U.S., and now we are also seeing that. All the three of them thought, "Why can't we do this in our home country?" That's why I said very shared values and a lot of things. I'll let Darko speak on why they came back and started an entrepreneurial journey.
Yes. At that time, it was more than 10 years ago now, we're sitting on a table, at the table and we decided. We were speaking about, you know, any of these ideas we were discussing because we were based in Stuttgart, you know, we had many connections with automotive industry. We came to the idea and be able to see how the millimeter wave radar sensor is going to be developed in the future. We decided to go back in Belgrade and set up and found the company. We started with five people, and today we have more than 150 people. All three of us are have electrical engineering background.
At the beginning of NOVELIC, we all were also designers, software developers, we did also the programming of these FPGA chips. We designed the chips also. We have also skills there. Slowly as the company, you know, progressed and became larger and larger, we actually started, you know, to see that there is really a potential that needs to be u sed in order to develop this idea.
Do you... Just one more question? Do you think you will also get benefit from Sona relationships, global relationships in some of the OEMs or customers that they have? You know, in Europe you have a good relationship, but they had to have a relationship China, U.S. as well, right? Is that our thought process, you know, while going with Sona?
Yes. Also, you know, having access to these customers and going hand-in-hand with our big brother, that's definitely something that can be useful for us, you know. Getting experience also from these relations with the OEMs or with the tier ones, how to deliver the products, how to communicate with them, how to, you know, set up these deals, how to go at the end into the production also of these products, that's something that definitely can Sona help us.
Great. I wish all the best to both of you, both Sona and NOVELIC. Thank you.
Thank you. Thank you.
I'll be there. Thank you.
Thank you. We take our next question from the line of Jinesh Gandhi from Motilal Oswal. Request you to screen and proceed with your question. Please accept the prompt, join as panelists and proceed.
Hi. Can you hear me?
Yes, we do.
Yes, we can hear you.
Hi. A couple of questions from my side. One is on the structure of the transaction. Can you talk about, for the balance 40%, is it linked to any milestones or it's just timing?
Just timing. I assume you're asking about the payment tranche.
Right. Right.
Remaining 46% of the equity will be held in equal proportion by the three co-founders.
Okay. any roadmap for, or any call options that Sona has to acquire balance 40%, 46% stake, or that's not yet part of the transaction?
No, it isn't, and it's also not part of our ideology.
Okay.
We are not chip designers, they are. We need to know what we are good at and what we bring to the table, and what they bring to the table and respect that.
Got it. Got it.
This is not an asset acquisition, Jinesh. This is a capability. Capability lies within the individuals, not in a building or a machine.
Sure, sure. What sum of money goes into of this EUR 40 million, how much goes into the company? You indicated, the $100 million revenues would be largely, funded.
Actually, I think, the details that Rohit shared, it is easy to do the math. The founders requested that we don't seek out how much they are getting. The pre-money and post-money valuation, if it is provided in the slide, I think it's.
Sure.
Very easy to work the math backwards.
Right.
I'd like you to do the math backwards.
This funding into the company will be good enough to take it to 100 million EUR as what you indicated?
Yes. If we stay on the business plan, the funding plus obviously the cash that is being generated by the company itself, this is a very high cash generation business. As you saw, 27% of it is net profit. With that and the growth is also a lot of free cash being thrown up. That plus the primary infusion should in all probability get us to our business plan and frankly a little beyond. You know, it's best to be a little conservative with these things. Capital will not let it become a constraint.
Right.
-to the growth of this company, neither have we for ourselves. We started, if you remember, in 2016, we were an INR 350 crore company, and we have got this far. We have not really. We're still, I think, pretty much debt-free, and we can accomplish a lot if we use our cash wisely.
Got it. Lastly, can you talk about the competitive landscape for this solution? I mean, not the technology, but the solution for cabin sensing and that way, where are we, NOVELIC, is in terms of market share might be the wrong word, but, where are we in terms of our competitiveness? If you can talk more about that. Thanks.
It's a very good question, but here solution and technology are both linked in a way. Veljko, Darko, Veselin, who wants to take this one? Please be gentle on your competition. You know, don't say anything bad about them. Please go.
Maybe I can, I can try on this one. Good question, actually. Very good one. First started among technologies basically. Like for every sensing a problem. At the beginning there was the millimeter wave radar that we were doing. There was camera, there were some other technologies. From recently, there is almost a consensus in the industry. Sorry.
Veljko, do you want to show the slide of camera versus radar versus lidar, if you have it. Prateek, do we have that? It's a very good question, Jinesh, in many ways. This perception problem, there are like, you know, people ask about hybrid versus electric versus hydrogen. We bet on electric, right? It's proven true. Right now that same thing is going on, although I think it's a multi-sensor thing. lidar, I don't know if it's or it's not, but it's okay. lidar is very, very, very expensive. Like, it's just insane. Camera is the cheapest, but it suffers from a lot of problems. Not just privacy. In many environmental conditions, it just doesn't work, and it is invasive, so not everybody appreciates that. Radar is bit of both. Plus, the mmWave that Veljko is talking about is so accurate that...
He has written a paper on it, by the way. I might send it to you later. That you can actually do a ECG. You can detect skin movement, you can get the heart rate, you can do an ECG using radar waves. It's that accurate. The insanely high level of accuracy, which is far beyond cameras, at a reasonable cost and not at a cost of LiDAR. That's the big, big advantage between the technologies. Veljko, again, you can go on with the competition within radar.
Yes. Exactly. The choice among technologies, then they're narrowed down to the millimeter wave radar for the applications that we are mentioning. Of course, here is important to say, and we will follow that story, that for the other applications that also exist in-cabin but also outside, there is no a single sensor which is the best solution in all terms. There will be always the coexistence of those. That's why we build our competencies focused on radar, but also ready to do the sensor fusion when the time comes. Now we are focused on the radar and on these particular features that we mentioned for the in-cabin. In that world regarding the competition, basically to date there is one tier one who is working directly on developing the solution.
There are many others who are from the companies like us. In that domain, basically, we do have a couple of competitors who joined quite late compared to us. You know, we started this back 10 years ago. We could have not been right, but luckily or maybe know-knowing some things about technology, we were right. We were ignored for the first five years that the radar will be technology for in-cabin. The people were quite reserved for that function. It proved to be the best performing and also safe on the other hand.
Now we are, let's say, a lot ahead of what those others are developing in terms of maturity, like I said on my part of the presentation, and the performance. We really understand both the technology but also the problems of the scenery and the application. There, you know, we are quite confident that. Of course, there is competition. There will be, like in all automotive value chains. I mean, it's unhealthy to have one supplier for any application.
We are very convinced that our solution has good unique selling point, and I would dare to say also the unfair advantage, when we are now taking off, while receiving the RFQs from OEMs.
Jinesh, I think we can take a few names, Veljko, because those are public. Like Veoneer, is doing something in sensors. Who else, that we can name? There was this Israeli company that got acquired by Harman right now.
Yes.
I don't see. Yeah.
Yes.
Okay.
We have the company called DeepSense-
Yeah.
-from Asia also, who is doing a similar solution. We have the company Pontosense. We have the company Vayyar.
Yeah.
Those are the companies who are, let's say, in the value chain on this, on the level where we are. Some of the tier ones are publicly working on that. Some are working, some are actually exhibiting today the solutions that also come from us. But like I said, in the tier one world, there is only one company with the in-cabin radar.
Got it. That tier one is working with you?
Sorry?
The name which you have taken is the same one, Infineon.
The tier one who is working and most advanced is working with the NOVELIC team. They obviously, you know, customer name they don't wanna take. It's a traditional tier one which is fairly advanced, and they are using NOVELIC chipsets on these things.
Just to correct, they do, they use our software and modules.
Yeah.
We are, by the way, regarding the chip for this technology, although we have the competencies for the chips, like Vivek mentioned. This is in, let's see, also in alignment with the philosophy of the new value chain that I mentioned before. We need to make smart partnerships and collaboration a lot more and lot stronger to get the products that we develop, which are quite complex. In this particular thing for the in-cabin, and that's also the public information, we are the preferred partner of Infineon. On their website, you can see NOVELIC is the preferred partner for in-cabin, also on our site.
That means we are using their chip, and we are our software and our module development part so that we make the fully integrated smart sensor for in-cabin. Yes.
Got it. Thanks and all the best.
Thank you.
Thanks, Jinesh. Good to see you.
Thank you.
Mr. Deshmukh, I think, has a flight. He's actually at an airport trying to board. I think Darko and Veselin are also at different airports. This is a truly global team. We have one person in Belgrade, one in Mumbai, two in Delhi, one in Amsterdam, and one in Las Vegas at the CES show. They're going straight from CES to India Auto Expo. While the next questioner comes, please do visit. I think you'll be able to understand much more at our scale.
Thank you. We invite the next question. That is from the line of Chirag Shah from Nomura. Chirag Shah, may we request you please accept the prompt to join us panelist and unmute your audio video and proceed with your question.
Hello, am I audible?
Yes.
You are audible.
Hi. There seems to be some issue with my video. I'll try to switch on. My question is, a very wonderful insight that you have shared, and congratulations to both the teams for this wonderful transaction. Two questions. From NOVELIC perspective, what is the inflection point as far as ADAS is concerned? Level 2 itself is the inflection point or Level 4 and 5? If it is Level 4 and 5, in your assessment today, realistically, how much time we'll need to achieve those levels? Because, and the enablers over there, where you can commercialize them.
Great question. Before we go to level 2, level 4, 5, actually, the biggest inflection point has come last year when NCAP, the rating, to get five-star rating, you have to have in-cabin sensing. Second will be when in 2025, this becomes a compulsory, a mandate, you know. You know that in many of our technologies that exist in automotive today, they got pushed because of safety reason by regulators, airbags, seatbelts. Similarly, in-cabin sensing, that's why I said that'll be the biggest industry. The inflection point will come when it becomes mandated by law, which should be 2025. In NCAP ratings, it has already come. That is already there. On other, the inflection point on the ASPER part, which is the sensory perception or autonomous part, I'll let Veljko or Darko answer. On what level would it become even more?
Although, Chirag, hard level , there is something. Veljko, you wanna take this?
Basically, for our in-cabin sensor, formally is, I think it's classified in level 2, but I'm not sure. What is more important than the level is the need and the regulation which requires and that we have a push on the rest. This is what gives us the confidence that, you know, this product is needed and it will reach in time to the market. Regarding the exterior function, basically, how shall I say? There are many players now working on all levels. The ones that do the thing, they claim they are on the level 5. There is a journey to get there.
On that journey, I think what industry realizes is that it will be very tough for many single companies, even the biggest ones, to resolve those functions. What we think is that, and what our strategy would be that we would have couple of, let's say, independent solutions which are covering some niche aspects of all levels of autonomous drivings, where we, let's say, own the complete product. For the ambitious systems for full autonomy, we think that we would be partnering with the others, and we would provide not necessarily the complete solution, but also the domain-specific subsystem, which resolves for a particular function within that level of autonomy.
This is the more the, let's say the road in which we believe in. For example, I can give you concretely. For example, within the short range radar. You have like in the level 3 already, you have like dozen of already. To really have the even the partial automation. You know, whereas many are speaking about their advancements in all domains, we are still facing the products which are, you know, which are at the best level in the radar world, they are level 2+ .
Correct.
Even the ones that claim they have level 5, there. This is how this story is complex. We think that if one has a good product, which resolves a particular niche and set of applications, then there would be definitely the need for that one.
Yeah. Chirag, it's more linear than exponential. Level 2, let's say there are already 10 or 12 sensor needs you require. At Level 3, you get to parking, kick sensor, doors, if you come close, proximity. Level 4, you increase more because more systems like become, you know, semi-autonomous or autonomous. It is a curve on which it keeps going up, but it's not a step function. It's a linear 45-degree kind of thing, and it just keeps increasing as autonomy increases. That would be a better way to picture it.
Yeah. In your assessment, moving one step away from, so from level two to level three or level three to level four, how much would it take? Is it a five to six year journey or you expect regulations to be helpful and it could happen much sooner?
That's a very good question. I don't think any of us can know the full answer. I would say the world is today at level 2.5 already very comfortably.
Okay.
Actually, the journey from 4-5 is the tricky one to predict, but I don't know, Veselin or Veljko, you wanna take a shot at 2.5-4? That's slightly easier to predict. Full driving by the vehicle or some people do claim it, That's quite far away. That's I think about 10 years away.
Easily?
Maybe 15. Maybe... I don't even know. 2.5 to 4, Veljko or Veselin, you wanna take a shot?
I just wanted to add that there is even now the debate in the industry whether level 3 and 4 actually makes sense to be deployed. Because, you know, they give you the freedom to, you know, to hand over to the vehicle to operate, but they also keep you accountable to react at any time. From that perspective, there is a debate whether be deployed. Anyhow, like Vivek said regarding the development, this must go in this linear way. From level 1 to 2 to 3 to 4 and so forth.
Mm-hmm.
How long... Yes. How long basically.
It's a tough one, I understand that. It will help you.
It is.
Yeah, it's a tough one. Lastly, if you'll excuse me, one question on the investment area that you're looking at. Whatever money that is coming in the company, and even beyond that, what are the areas where you're looking to put the money to use? Is it more capacity? There is more capability? Within capabilities, what are you looking at to add?
That I'll let, you know, the NOVELIC team answer. Again, the investment, the current one and the business plan that we have spoken about is only restricted to ACAM, in-cabin, ASFA, which is outside cabin, and licensing and services. That's it. These three revenue stream. There is potential to add actually many more. As you would have now realized with us that what we started out with even when we IPOed were only three, four products. Every year we add at least three, four new products, so revenue streams keep getting added. Right now that is for that. However, this what is the CapEx deployed? Veljko, actually Veljko is in charge of spending the money, so he should answer, where this is going.
Basically, most of that will go into the developing the programs that we are in today. It's really in the investment in competencies. Of course, some parts would go in investing, in preparing for the serial production and manufacturing. Especially for this exterior radar that you mentioned, the ASPER. Especially for the aftermarket and also heavy machine and two, three-wheeler segments. There we also plan to ship the complete modules with hardware and software.
You don't need investment in human capital. You need to add more people as you move to $100 million. You will need to add more people on the development side or that has been invested already?
We will grow in the, in the number of people also, definitely, yes.
Thank you.
So-
All the best.
Yeah, Chirag, to add to what Darko already said, we also need to add in people side because we're getting into serial production now, also product people. So I think Darko and all are already hiring great product guys from fairly reputable companies like, you know, Microsoft, et cetera. So we are getting a good product and program. Serial production, as I said earlier, when you go from a few to a few million, there is a journey. So apart from just machine and infra and assembly and, you know, benches, we also need to get the right people for the right kind of growth.
Yeah. Thank you very much, and all the best.
Thank you too.
Thank you. We invite the next question from the line of Siddhartha Bera from Nomura. Please accept the prompt on your screen, join as panelist, and proceed with your question. Mr. Siddhartha Bera, I request you to accept the prompt on your screen and proceed with your question.
While Siddhartha joins, Raman, if I may request, You know us and we ordinarily never close the call early. It's been one and a half hours. Mr. Deshmukh's already left for his flight. Two other gentlemen have to leave for flights. Since we've been on this deal closing for the last week or so, we haven't, any of us have not slept really for a long time. If this could be the last question, we love to talk. Again, please visit us and we'll talk there. It's been a long, I'd say seven, eight days for all of us.
Yeah.
Sure.
Hi, sir. Thanks for the opportunity. Sir, Most of the questions have been answered. Just, I think, on the addressable size which you had indicated, will it be fair to say that, I mean, the mix will be more skewed towards products and less of tech, or it can be more of tech and less of products? Even within that, in terms of the addressable market, will the in-vehicle and outside vehicle be similar or there is segment which is bigger? Sir, some clarity on these aspect.
Sure. I would say if you are looking at NOVELIC 2028, the larger part of revenue comes from products. In product, the largest product should be ACAM just because value per unit would just be higher. Second largest should be ASPER, followed by the third category of products. Would still constitute, I'm trying to break Siddharth technology. Everything is technology. The product that you use, the way we are speaking to each other is technology, right? However, the device that you use is the product, and the services are the solution that you can't see, but you're getting charged for. Highest score as the operating system or the service provider or the telecom network provider, right? We will be doing both. Any guess, Darko or Veselin, on what is the...
Well, you guys know, but just give a ratio of product to service. 70/30, is that fair?
Yes. That's, that's fair, roughly, Vivek, that you mentioned. Yeah.
70/30. 70 product, 30 services and licensing. Licensing is repeating recurring revenue without extra effort or expense. Those are great revenue streams to have, and we don't want to let go. Which is why it's harder. I said, this is a combination. We already started doing it, right? When we started realizing and some people ask us why our margin higher than others in the industry. It's because we are not a pure product company even now. A lot of what we do is because the product is high technology, a lot of services are being attached, and we are getting the money for it. It's similar, but even more, I would say tech-intensive.
Understood. Thanks a lot, sir.
Thank you. We have one last text question. Should we proceed with that?
Please, of course.
All right. Thank you. That is from the line of Prateek Poddar from Nippon India Mutual Fund. Could you please talk about how would you charge the OEMs for mmWave radar products? Would it be SaaS-based or based on price part? Also, which third-party chip suppliers are we using to embed our software on?
That actually is a very good question. I have to compliment Prateek. I think the best question is saved for the last bit. Okay. Who wants to take this one? It is a very, very relevant question on how the pricing model also will be developed, and is it a SaaS-based model, or is it product plus both? Which chipset, Veljko, you can go with which chip are we embedded with.
Okay. Yeah, regarding the chips that we are using, we are partnering with Infineon, with Texas Instruments, with NXP for various various product developments. Particularly for in-cabin solution, we are partnering with Infineon because we identified their chip as the best fit for that product and to put in our software. Regarding the pricing model, I think Veselin can amendment that. SaaS is, of course, something that is envisioned for the future. I think there we will accommodate basically to how the complete value chain behaves.
I think the OEMs now need have the way to go on their pricing model, and then that will respectively, you know, translate to all the tiers in the chain with different, you know, for their different features that we are providing. We can imagine in the future, which is not so distant, that this sensor, for example, has like a mandatory function which is regulated by law, which is child presence detection. One can pay for intrusion detection. To have, let's say, the alarm feature set on or off depending, you know, whether he's spending his summer in some isolated island or in some dense city or so.
This is the future that is definitely coming. For the third generation of the products, we are definitely going to the model where we charge per piece of our IP or product delivered. Maybe Veselin can comment more on that.
Just, I would like to say also, if you look at carefully new experiences now for show here in Las Vegas, I think there is a tendency in the future, in five to 10 years that, at least, many car manufacturers say, "We are a software company, we have a software vehicle." I said, "It's very nice to say you are a software vehicle, if you have a hardware component enabling this software that, how are you differentiating?" That means, there is this tendency to try to put some kind of, how should I say? new business model. I don't know. We are listening this carefully. We just want...
do not want to come to the position to act under classical, you know, purchasing pressure, keep the price down. We would like to say, "How can I help you to make a more interesting business model so that you are happy about this?" This is something which we are seriously thinking. We cannot disclose too much right now, but we are trying also in a very dense communication and exchange with Tier 1s, but I need to say also with OEMs. This is actually what we previously said, everything is changing. Tier 2 companies can go and engage with OEMs directly. To try to find what is the best solution for the business model which is convenient for both sides.
I think a lot of things will happen. We think that the classical type of approach will keep for the next few years. I really don't know how much and how fast the things will change after five years' time.
Correct. let me summarize-
We will see a lot of changes in the business models.
I'll just summarize, Prateek, because it was an excellent question and what we wondered about that 10 years later, how do you monetize technology? Revenue monetization models would be one, and I think at least for both HM and ASPER, large part would be still the traditional the OEM buys the module on which we can play one of two parts, exactly like we do in differential. We could either be the software guys and we can be the software plus the hardware guys. Same as we do in, let's say, our driveline business. We can either be the guys who do the whole gearbox or we can be just the differential assembly guys. That's why the two levels. That should still stay the largest form of the monetization model.
Second one would be in licensing and what Veljko talked about, like, imagine your car as a device, like a smartphone. You can download apps on it. All the apps exist. If you pay, there is a paid version or a not, and then some of the apps which are only paid. If you pay for intrusion alarm, that intrusion alarm will become active. The hardware for it is inbuilt by default. The software becomes active and per use, the provider or the licenser gets paid. That should become our second revenue stream. Third, not directly to OEM, but even tier two, tier one. Like I said, the boundaries have just gone away. The same guy can be a competitor, the same guy would be a customer.
Currently a lot of leading OEMs are integrating very large systems with sensing software and sensing hardware, which NOVELIC already provides today. This thing should also continue to grow as functionality is increased. Yeah, many avenues to monetize as mobility itself starts shifting. I mean, if you go very into the future, mobility as a service would become that for a person it is the journey from point A to point B. It could be done using many devices that are all provided by the same integrator. You could get into a subway, get out, get into a bus, get into a car, and then in the end take a scooter if that is the best thing that your mobility provider pays. You pay by using. A lot of this is evolving. We are prepared for all of that.
Even if nothing happens, like I said, the traditional way of shipping the whole product, that works. You fit it in, as they say, plug and play. That should still remain a large part of it. On the chipset part, we work with literally every chip provider. However, for the in-cabin sensing, we are embedded with Infineon. For other applications, we work with Texas Instruments, NXP and Infineon and IRIS. Excellent question, Prateek.
Thank you. That will be our last question for today. I now look to hand the call over to Mr. Vivek Vikram Singh for closing com.
Thank you so much, everyone for listening. We are available to explain this and more. Even the NOVELIC team would be available, twelfth, thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth at the Auto Expo in Pragati Maidan, Delhi. Hope to see as many of you there as possible. As you know, we are fairly approachable as a team. We also really, really love feedback, so as much feedback as possible. It helps us iterate, improve and get better. Thank you so much.
Thank you very much.
Thank you.
Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of Sona Comstar, that concludes today's session. Thank you for your participation. You may now click on the Exit Meeting to disconnect.