BirlaNu Limited

Baidik Sarkar

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Dhirup Roy Choudhary

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Dhirup Roy Choudhary

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Shivan Sarvaiya

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Dhirup Roy Choudhary

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Dhirup Roy Choudhary

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Dhirup Roy Choudhary

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Dhirup Roy Choudhary

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VP Rajesh

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Dhirup Roy Choudhary

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Any outlook on how the supply chain that is looking and is inflation in power costs in Germany should be seen as a headwind?

— Baidik Sarkar

Yes, situations are very difficult, but your team is fully on the job, and I can assure you that.

— Baidik Sarkar

This definitely have created an inflationary pressure in all European countries, which have thrown open the new challenges for us in way of negative consumer sentiments, DIYs that dried out, consumers are not spending enough for renovations as it start with sales today in Europe.

— Baidik Sarkar

And, we definitely see this market sentiments to continue to be weak, at least for another quarter or two.

— Baidik Sarkar

So Q2 in PARADOR is always a weak quarter being summer and this year it will be definitely challenging.

— Dhirup Roy Choudhary

But then came in a huge cost pressure on steel and everything and suddenly the project cost went to a different leg which was absolutely uneconomical for us and had stopped the placement of the new greenfield for AAC blocks and rather looked at alternative methods to still ramp up in East.

— Dhirup Roy Choudhary

Therefore, it will be very difficult for us to pinpoint where our focus will be.

— Dhirup Roy Choudhary

The costs have gone up immensely and sea freights are the other bit, which has not softened between Brazil and India, which is continuously posing a headwind for us.

— Amit Vora

Nikhil, PARADOR volume will be a very, very difficult work because there are too many SKUs of different varieties.

— Dhirup Roy Choudhary

I know it's a very difficult time right now and you already called out that Q2 would be weak.

— Nikhil Gada

Is it still very difficult to take price hikes in the market right now to sort of pass on this RM cost?

— Nikhil Gada

I would say, the entire cost rise of materials and building materials would be passed on so far as we are concern.

— Dhirup Roy Choudhary

But, the team has already gathered in recognizing these risks, and there is a very, very clear charter on risk mitigation that we are doing and therefore, we will be far better than our competitors in those things.

— Dhirup Roy Choudhary

There's lots of concern in Europe at the moment on demand, on inflation.

— Dhirup Roy Choudhary

Q

Mr. Choudhary, good morning and congratulations on a strong quarter given the constraints of inflation around us. A couple of questions and in interest of time, I will lay them altogether. First up on Roofing, Mr. Choudhary, there was an indication that Roofing volumes might have been tad tepid towards the end of May and June. Just wanted your comments on how we performed on the volume front and given one month into Q2, how does the current quarter look like growth wise and margin wise? There were issues around high container transportation costs in Q4 and having in Q1 as well, so, any insight

Baidik Sarkar

You know, did you allude that Q2 might be a profitable quarter for PARADOR or did you mean that we should probably experience that by Q3 of this financial year? So Q2 in PARADOR is always a weak quarter being summer and this year it will be definitely challenging. Q3, I am sure that situation will ease out, in many ways because the material costs will start coming down as the inventory builds up or as the demands go down. And I am very positive Q3 will be better.

Q

Sir, my question was on the Building Solutions business and specifically in the Boards and Panels part. So sir, could you give some understanding on the industry structure and what are the growth rates that the industry is seeing because when I look at this particular business and when I read certain industry reports, the sense that I get is that the industry is growing at say about early teens kind of growth rate. But when I look at the benefits of dry walling, the speed at which the building can be done, etcetera one would expect a much faster clip in the growth rate. So, sir, could you give

Dhirup Roy Choudhary

Shivan, you are absolutely dot right and I compliment your business knowledge in the market. This is a segment which is showing up and its furthermore favorable for HIL because over the last couple of years, a lot of efforts have been made in PIN code mapping, in heat maps, in BI tool that we are using to map really where the activities are and Tier 2, Tier 3 cities, we have actually migrated in many ways, from the Tier 1 big customers to a lot of these small customers in the deep pockets of the country. And I can tell you that we are very, very upbeat on this segment as well as you are. Our c

Q

Hi, congratulations on a good set of numbers, too. My first question is regarding the Roofing business. I think you mentioned that there was some pricing weakness in Q1. So, did we lose market share or did we gain market share because of these pricing movements?

Dhirup Roy Choudhary

So, in Roofing, I mentioned and I am happy to repeat. We have gained market share in Q1, and we are #1 by far big numbers to the next level. Okay. So then why would that player which is much smaller try to undercut on the pricing? Do they have added more capacity? Or is there any player in the industry who has entered, if you could give some color on that? So, Q1 is the most potent quarter for Roofing, everyone knows that. Prices in Q1 for Roofing products are the highest in the year, and therefore, everyone would try to make the best of it. And I can only emphasize that if you have not done w

Q

Yes. First of all, you have given a good heads-up in the previous quarter of what is to come. So, that has been really helpful to understand and make sure how things will be. I have a few questions. One is on the Roofing segment. I understand Q2, Q3 are softer, but just to understand, where is it on the raw material side? Is the competition facing some problems in terms of getting raw materials, going forward from Kazakhstan and Russia? That's one. Second, Pipes, what would be our utilization level and the loss that we have reported in the segment? Is it majorly from one of the segment? Or, we

Amit Vora

Okay. Rs. 4 crore EBITDA is what I heard, is that correct? Yes, they are at Rs. 4.5 crore to 5 crore roughly on an annualized basis in the present scale that they are operating. At 60% utilization. So, there is definitely room for the HIL’s efficiency in your leadership, we can just definitely take that up. Just one question, if I may squeeze through. Is the UK subsidiary that we have set up for PARADOR, is it in same line the way we have done it for China JV? Or what is the rationale and one more thing is the rationale for that? That's it. And then I will join back in the queue. Again, a good

Q

Hello. I want to ask regarding the outlook on the Pipe Solutions. So basically, in the market, such as aggressive players like Astral and Apollo, which has a great distribution already set in place. What is the right to win in that particular segment? And, can you please share about any capex plan in this segment?

Dhirup Roy Choudhary

Thank you, Mr. Shah. Pipes business is a very interesting business. There are big pies as we say there, and then there are lots of smaller players. The rationale of our huge momentum in pipes is because, first of all, it's a big market. The market is driven by three big pillars: one, a good quality product; number two, a great spread in the market, so retail presence; and number three, the brand. So, unlike any other product, this one is our brand pull business. So, we have all three, and over the months and years, we have developed ourselves to be on top of all three. So, we have the best pro

Q

Sir, just first couple of questions from a data perspective. If you can give the volume and value growth. Value growth we know, but volume growth for the Roofing as well as the PARADOR business for Q1?

Dhirup Roy Choudhary

Nikhil, PARADOR volume will be a very, very difficult work because there are too many SKUs of different varieties. I can only say that we have de grown on sales in quarter 1 on PARADOR because we had an extremely good quarter 1 last year. In volume terms for Roofing, we have grown by 6% over last year. And last year, quarter 1 was a very, very high-volume gain for Roofing, where we had crossed 350,000 metric tons. So going over that was a very big target, and we have been able to achieve that. And sir, when we say that we gained 1% market share, so then is it fair to assume that the industry m

Q

Good morning, Dhirup Ji. Congratulations for this strong performance in another challenging quarter. And, my first question, in annual report, you mentioned we are entering Construction Chemicals in next financial year. So, what are the products we are using and that can you give us some details? Second question, are we manufacturing GFRP panels? If not, do we have any plan to enter into that market?

Dhirup Roy Choudhary

Thank you. Satish Ji, we had already talked about our entire blueprint of $1 billion, let's say, Rs. 7,000 crore by 2026, where Roofing will achieve, where building materials which achieve where Polymers and where flooring will be. There was always a delta of Rs. 1,500 crore to Rs. 1,700 crore, which had to be gotten through other verticals. We have canvassed the entire market. We have looked at various products, which are complementary, which can be through the same route to market. And, Construction Chemicals came out to be the best amongst all that we have been able to view. Of course, Pain

Q

Just need the clarification with respect to our Building Solutions segment. We were setting up some capacity in the East, and I know we have done an acquisition now. So, is that capacity come on board? Is it scrap? What is the status, if you could just share that?

Dhirup Roy Choudhary

Thank you. So we had three projects in East for which Rs. 82 crore of capex was approved by all of you. One was to enhance our Roofing manufacturing facility to make non-asbestos boards there. And I think that facility will come on board in the next 2 months' time. The second one was to have a complete brand-new Greenfield project for making panels. The facing sheet will go from this Roofing manufacturing capacity, and then we will do the sandwich, and we will finally make the Panel. So, that particular facility is coming up on speed. I think by the quarter 4, we will be able to start commerci

Q

See, my question is majorly on the strategic and that how are we going to execute the strategy? Since we said that for PARADOR, we are going to have like a target of achieving Euro 400 million turnover. Currently, we are only at Euro 200 million only. So, this is not going to be achieved by just an inorganic way. I know that like this year, we have incorporated a new company in UK. So, my question is that how much turnover we are expecting from the UK? And then, to leap frog from Euro 200 million to Euro 400 million which other market are we trying to enter? Are we already covering the entire

Dhirup Roy Choudhary

Again, a very good question, and I can give take hours to explain this, but let me be brief. We are very, very clear on how we wish to grow in PARADOR. So, it's not just a dream, it's something that we are putting into practice since last almost 1.5-2 years. We have got a bit of a jolt in this growth process owing to first COVID, where travels were hugely restricted and thereafter, came in the material crisis last year and now the geopolitical. But that's not broken our intention to grow at all. Euro 140 million was PARADOR when we bought it about 2 years back. We have come to Euro 190 million

Q

Sir, so I was asking regarding PARADOR. Do we say that the worst of the margins is behind us? Or is still there a some pain to go?

Dhirup Roy Choudhary

Give me one more quarter to answer that question, sir. We are still evaluating how this war is going to span out and what kind of dent it leaves behind to us. There's lots of concern in Europe at the moment on demand, on inflation. I don't think I have an answer very ready for you. We are completely ready for all that we have to face there as a team, but I don't think everything is behind us yet. Thank you very much, everyone, for this wonderful interaction. I hope I have been able to clarify your concerns, and I hope I have been able to transparently paint the picture of what we are going thr