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Today is 11th June and we bring you great insights from multiple concalls for Q4FY25 and interesting insights from the managements in music industry and shipbuilidng industry
PDSL
“Profitability First” agenda with clear mandates for each vertical
“Each vertical is now under tight review of proactive realignment and business heads have an unambiguous mandate: hit the budget, cut the cost or fund the losses.”
— Sanjay Jain, Group CEO
BCG-led cost-optimization initiative across the platform
“We have initiated a cost optimization program with BCG… even at the half-point of implementation we have identified savings that we believe will start flowing through in H2.”
— Sanjay Jain, Group CEO
Capex-light near-term growth in Knit Gallery
“There are about 2,200 machines in Knit Gallery… we have no immediate need for any capex—at a small incremental cost we can extract 10–15% more revenue and commensurate profitability.”
— Sanjay Jain, Group CEO
South Indian Bank
Retail-deposit focus & liability mix
“Retail deposits excluding bulk deposits grew by 7%. So as an institution, we did moderate the total quantum of bulk deposits and bulk deposits as a percentage of our total deposits is now close to about 2.5% or thereabout.”
— P. R. Seshadri
MSME portfolio stabilization & growth foundation
“The MSME book, actually, after a long time, we stabilized the book. We didn’t grow very much during the year, but we stabilized it. There was no shrinkage. … Quarter 4 was our best. … we are reasonably confident that you will see substantial growth in the MSME balance sheet as we go through this year.”
— P. R. Seshadri
Transformation investments beginning to pay off
“We think that we put in place a lot of effort … build new systems, new processes, so that the transformation of this organization … can take place. … we are at a juncture where all the investments that we have made over the last 18 months or so should begin to start paying off.”
— P. R. Seshadri
Sona BLW
Navigating U.S. tariff uncertainty with a long-term consolidation view
“So first, what's on top of mind for everyone, the tariffs announced by the U.S. administration, including on automobile and auto component imports… In our opinion, they will adversely impact the demand for cars and light trucks. Although we believe our competitive positioning will improve further if tariffs persist… However, in the medium to long term, we expect many opportunities to emerge from this chaos.”
Clear strategic scorecard via five Key Result Areas (KRAs)
“For the full year, like every year, we’d like to report our performance scorecard as managers to you on our 5 KRAs – financials, electrification, business development, diversification, and new product development.”
Bold foray into the nascent humanoid-robotics market
“We’re also planning to enter a new area, which at this stage may be where EV was in 2016. … Humanoid robots have potential applications in a lot of industries, services, as well as households… we expect a rapid adoption of humanoid robots over the next decade.”
Deepak Fertilizers
Crop-specific fertilizers (“Croptek”) driving repeat demand
“Our crop-focused specialty product, Croptek, more than doubled in its volume in Q4, up 111% Y-o-Y basis. … that speaks very strongly about the value proposition that they are seeing in terms of the Croptek or the crop-specific fertilizers.”
Integrated LNG→ammonia→acid→downstream chain as a “uniquely available” moat
“The biggest advantage that we see in ourselves is now integrated advantage emerging out of a long-term tied up LNG contract, then from LNG, ammonia… and then reaching up to the downstream… this kind of a complete value chain is something which will be very, very unique to the Deepak Fertilisers Group.”
New‐capacity projects on track for H2 FY26 contribution
“Building upon the same strength, we have also taken up projects of enhancing capacities on nitric acid at Dahej and on our technical ammonium nitrate at Gopalpur… both of them, we are looking at somewhere, H2 of FY ‘26 to bring it into our financial fold.”
Time Technoplast
In '25. Yes. Now, especially I mentioned in my discussion that we are estimating composite product growth of 30% as against the other products business, 10% to 12%, because the base is very small for composite product is concerned. And in my call also I have mentioned, current, which is 27% of my total revenue is composite product, which I am expecting 35% in the next 3 years' time, because even though company is growing at a CAGR of 15%. So if you ask me in terms of the value, if you ask me 3 years down the line, the composite business 3 years down the line can be INR 1,500 crores, which includes LPG, CNG and hydrogen put together. Hydrogen, we are ahead in all the terms. We have the approvals for drone applications. We have approvals for the normal applications in automotive sectors. But this product what we have done, Jatin bhai, I will tell you and clarify.
When my CNG expansion is coming up, where we are investing INR 125 crores, which almost INR 80- 85 crores have been done, equipment is going to arrive in this current financial year and the separate plant will be ready. In the second half, we will launch the commercial production of the CNG from my expansion capacity. I just recall our talk, and I am clarifying that my existing capacity of CNG is 480 cascades; in terms of the cylinder is 30,000 cylinders, which is going to be increased by 36,000 cylinders; in terms of the cascade, 600 cascades. So the total will be 1,080 cascades, where the revenue op can be generated around INR 800 crores as against current revenue of INR 350 crores, so there's enough potential.
Again, compressed biogas requirement is there, then mobile refilling unit market. So almost INR 28,000 crore composite products market is already there. So we will first try to achieve, and we are ourselves keeping targeting the 5 years down the line, we are estimating business of INR 2,500 crores from the composite products because 30% growth we are achieving
In fact, internally target based on my all projects considered, there will be the maintenance CAPEX for the automation reengineering continue, and that covers around INR 80 crores to INR 85 crores. That is already covered. INR 122 crores is inclusive brownfield expansion, new products, CNG, LPG development product, all covered in that. I am not revising my guidelines of up to INR 200 crores of the CAPEX. That will continue at least till I am achieving the growth of 15%, and I have to achieve the composite product growth of 30% for at least next 3 years.
— Bharat Vageria
Music industry
Saregama
“Between financial year '25 to '27, we committed to invest over INR1,000 crores in new music content. Of this, content worth close to INR525 crores - INR530 crores are already secured. This will contribute not only to the immediate growth, but also put the company on a long-term growth path.”
- Vikram Mehra
“We believe subscription if it continues to grow at the rate it's growing today, which is when two of the big platforms, Spotify and Jio are still offering free service, keeping that in mind, we have our projection is 22% to 23%, which tells you we are fairly confident that the impacts may be happening right now in the short term here and there. But on a medium-term basis, we believe there's a very healthy growth potential, which is sitting in.”
- Vikram Mehra
“The other big highlight of the year for us was that our digital footprint across YouTube, Instagram and Facebook grew from 239 million as of last year to 350 million during the year. That's a massive growth right now by any yardstick.”
- Vikram Mehra
Tips Music
Detailed Industry and business explanation
“I think if you see the overall industry, our total industry is around INR3,500 crores, INR4,000 crores in that range. And we have a potential to grow around INR10,000 crores in the next 4 to 5 years. So, I feel we can really grow, maybe after 2 years, maybe there is some dip or some minor thing will happen. But again, it will compensate for next 1 or 2 years, it will compensate. So I feel we are in a very, very right time, right content. Really, we are in the best place I feel. I strongly believe this business we are the lowest if you see compared to U.S., U.K. and all those markets. Let me tell you, subscription, people doubt if subscription will grow or what will happen to subscription, what we again and again mentioning. In 2007-08, there was a business called CRBT, Caller Ring Back Tone. On that, when I call you, you have some tone and I'm listening to that music.
Actually, you are keeping that music for me and that is also only 30 seconds. And that time, you were paying INR30 as a subscription and INR15 you are paying for a download of any new song. If you download three, four songs in a month, so you are paying another INR15 per transaction. So if you download three songs, you are paying INR45 plus INR30, INR75. And that time that mobile companies used to recover INR5,000 crores from subscription and INR3,000 crores from downloading. So that is a business. And music companies used to get only INR700 crores, INR800 crores. So, I think that time is coming back.
People will subscribe and it will be a big business and Indian consumer at that time also everybody was feeling where is the money coming from. It was from small towns, Lucknow, Kanpur, Pune, Sangli, Kolhapur, Solapur, all those small town people were paying. If you remember, I think our business has a huge capability. INR10,000 crores is becoming a I feel, and it will happen actually
Garvit, what we have said earlier also, we are targeting that content budget of 25% to 28%. And , we will be targeting that growth. But depending on the releases, how it comes up in which quarter and everything, so there could be minor variations.”
— Kumar Taurani
Ship Building
GRSE
And at the outset, thank you on behalf of because, since we are a Ministry of Defence entity on behalf of the Indian Armed Forces, thank you for your good wishes and appreciation. Coming first to SWAN and Clusters, I would like to clarify and clear that an answer to an earlier query. We have MOUs or agreements, not only with SWAN, we also have with competent private players, private and public players for collaboration towards the construction of vessels. I will give you an example, I have a running collaboration with one of the South based shipyards for construction, part construction of few of the vessels.
So, these are project specific, and this has got nothing to do about the clusters that I mentioned, a cluster, what the ministry of shipping had talked about, and what we expect to be implemented is creation of a greenfield facility. When I say greenfield facility, which would mean a shipyard surrounded by its ancillary industries, this is still in liquid form, multiple state governments, these are all open domain information, multiple state governments, like Gujarat, Maharashtra, Karnataka, Odisha, Andhra and Tamil Nadu, have enhanced the interest and approached the various shipyards and also floated the expression of interest for creation of greenfield shipyards there and we have also responded, responding to few of this.
As I mentioned, our order book stands at ₹22,680 crores and P-17 Alpha still continues to be the biggest bread earner. We are left with around ₹11,435 crores from P-17 Alpha project. The Anti-Submarine Shallow Watercraft project ₹3,946 crores. The Survey Vessel Large project, it is 6 actually on the anvil of closing so, ₹530 crores, the Offshore Patrol Vessel i.e. NGOPV project, ₹3,327 crores. The non-defence platforms, the NCPOR Ocean Research Vessel, ₹785 crores, the Acoustic Research Ship, ₹466 crores, the Ferry project, ₹226 crores. And the export projects, the Multipurpose Vessel, Dredger and so on, around ₹1,200 crores. And the 30 mm Gun project, ₹201 crores.
So, this is the order break up. Now coming to you had asked a question about, what is the likely the value of the projects that are on the anvil. As I had mentioned, the Next Generation Corvette project is a high value project, and here we expect, our anticipation is that the total order value could be to the tune of ₹40,000 plus crores. But this ₹40,000 crore will be split between two shipyards, with the L1 shipyard getting 5 ships, that is 5/8, which means the L1 shipyard, the order of value could be to the tune of ₹25,000 plus crores, which is a very big order.
Coming to the Next Generation Survey Vessel, our appreciation is that the order value could be to the tune of around ₹3,500 crores. And the 18 NGFPV project could be to the tune of ₹3,000 crores. The OPV project could be to the tune of around ₹2,500 crores. And the Multipurpose Vessel to the tune of around ₹1,200 crores. The Water Jet FAC project, the 31 Water Jet FAC project, could be this tune of around ₹3,000 crores, it could be plus or minus ₹200 crores, depending upon how the bidding goes and the Fast Intercepted Craft Vessel to the tune of around ₹1,500 to ₹1,800 crores.
The bigticket items, the Mine Counter measure Vessels project, the AON itself has been taken for ₹32,000 crores. And that's a 12 ship project, single shipyard getting all the 12 ships as per the AON conditions and the P-17 Bravo project, this again is a high value project. There are two shipyards being, there is a seven ship project. Two shipyards would be involved in this project, with the total AON value to the tune of around ₹70,000 crores. And at this juncture, I would not like to give any assumptions on the LPD and NGT, because they are still in liquid form. You had asked something about this ₹433 crore.
— Cmde P. R. Hari
Mazdock
You have seen a growth of 20% on a year-to-year basis, but that was a time when we had a steady order book. Since the order book for new P-75 and P-75(I) is little bit delayed, so some time will be going towards the design and finalization of the basic parameters for their execution. So it may not be correct to say that this 20% will be maintained. But by and large we will see that the growth of the company is almost around 8% to 10% every year.
I think there is significant tailwinds that is going to further propel our growth, both the commercial shipbuilding as well as in the defence shipbuilding because of the geopolitical situation. And as you've seen, both the Navy is likely to come out with the RFP for the 17 Bravo frigates shortly, which is a 70,000 crore project. And we are poised best to take on that although it is going to come on a competitive bidding but MDL with its proven capability and infrastructure and having demonstrated to have constructed and delivered these ships profitably we are best placed to actually win these contracts. In addition, the Navy is also coming with a Rs. 44,000 crore MCMV project it's set at AON stage that's also likely the RFP is also likely in a few months from now. So there are a lot of orders in the pipeline both for the defense as well as for the commercial ship building sector.
- Capt. Jagmohan
Conclusion
This collection of insights paints a vibrant picture of diverse sectors poised for growth and transformation. From PDSL's focus on profitability and cost optimization, South Indian Bank's strategic investments and MSME growth, Sona BLW's foray into new markets, Deepak Fertilizers' integrated value chain, and Time Techno Electric's ambitious growth in composite products, the landscape is rich with innovation. Furthermore, the music industry's digital expansion and the robust order books in shipbuilding signal significant opportunities. These snapshots collectively suggest a dynamic and evolving market environment, where strategic initiatives, adaptability, and long-term vision are key drivers of success.
Minor correction: Time Technoplast instead of Time Techno Electric :-)