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Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the earnings conference call of Everest Kanto Cylinder Limited.
I now hand the conference over to Mr. Mitesh Jain from CDR India. Thank you, and over to you, sir.
Thank you. Good evening, everyone, and thank you for joining us on Everest Kanto Cylinder's Q2 FY26 Earnings Conference Call. We have with us today, Mr. Puneet Khurana, Managing Director; and Mr. Sanjiv Kapur, Chief Financial Officer of the company.
We will initiate the call with opening remarks from the management, following which we will have the forum open for a question-and-answer session. Before we begin, I would like to state that some statements made in today's call may be forward-looking in nature and a disclaimer to this effect has been included in the results presentation shared with you all earlier.
I would now request Mr. Puneet Khurana to make his opening remarks. Over to you, Mr. Khurana.
Good evening, everyone, and thank you for joining our earnings call. I will begin by sharing our overview of performance for the quarter followed by the Q&A session.
In Q2 FY26, we delivered a steady performance. Consolidated revenue stood at 360.4 crores, and EBITDA was at 42.9 crores, translating to a margin of 11.9%.
PAT for the quarter was 13.7 crores. On a standalone basis, revenue stood at
232.4 crores, and the margin improved to 11.2% compared with 9.3% the same period last year.
During the quarter, the CNG segment in India was impacted by GST transition in the end-user automotive industry, which led to a short-term softness in the volumes. This has since normalized, and the underlying domestic demand environment in the segment remains supportive. Our Industrial segment continues to perform in line with expectations.
In our international operations, the US business reflected the order-driven nature of the market. While dispatches were lower during the quarter, performance for the first half remains healthy. Margins in the region were affected by higher operating costs, and we have been investing in strengthening our teams and capabilities to support business scale-up. Overall, the outlook for the US remains strong, with the order book providing healthy visibility for the second half of FY26. Our operations in the Middle East also recorded early signs of improvement during the quarter.
On the expansion front, we are making steady progress on new facilities in Mundra and Egypt. The Egypt plant is preparing to begin trial production shortly and the work at Mundra continues to be at advance as planned. Both facilities remain on schedule and will significantly enhance our manufacturing capabilities in the coming year, enabling us to serve a wider range of domestic and international opportunities.
With growing opportunities across clean energy and industrial applications, coupled with great visibility in our order pipeline, we remain confident about our future growth perspectives. Our focus remains on operational excellence, capability development, and supporting customer across geographies, as we build for the next phase of growth for EKC.
With that, I conclude my opening remarks and request the moderator to open the floor for questions.
Thank you very much sir. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. First question is from the line of Ashit R. Kothi and Individual Investor. Please go ahead.
Sir, just would want to understand more on hydrogen. I mean, say, the next major fuel, which is being considered as in hydrogen. How are we based on that? And if EV vehicles are going to take a centre stage, in that scenario, where does our CNG business would stand.
Hydrogen development in India has already started. Government is giving a lot of push on hydrogen. We have projects from companies like and IOCL and HPCL. There are some projects going on in hydrogen and definitely, it will be coming as a mobility fuel in the future. But this future will take time because the entire ecosystem needs to be set up, and all the stakeholders need to come together. So it is looking positive, but it is early days for hydrogen now today.
We do not expect anything much happening on that front for next couple of years?
Yes. But it is looking good, and hydrogen will be complementary to us. The faster it comes better because, again, hydrogen storage is at very high pressure and cylinders are required there. Definitely a very positive thing for us is the faster it comes.
In this case, what will be our growth drivers for the next couple of years?
Our growth driver is CNG which continues to be a growth driver, plus Industrial business also is growing. Many new applications for industrial gases are coming up.
We are seeing many new avenues is growing, defence sector is growing. So there is lots of avenues that we see the future of growth.
Any specific area where you would be concentrating, sir?
I mean, we are concentrating on CNG and industrial. We are concentrating both on these sectors because they are growing. Definitely, we continue to focus on these sectors.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Garvita Jain from Seven Islands PMS. Please go ahead.
I have a few questions. One of them is, could you give a rationale why is the gross margin falling this quarter compared to last quarter?
The CNG bit of the business was a little down. So that is where the volumes have dropped.
Okay. And sustainable would be for the year?
Yes, definitely, it will pick up. It is picking up as we speak. So it will definitely improve.
Any margin guidance can you give me, sir?
The margin guidance would be 12% to 14%. That will be the EBITDA margin, right? Yes.
And sir, could you give me guidance for the revenue also top line and volume guidance?
Revenue. I think revenue should be okay as you look at it over the period of the whole entire year. I think it should be okay as for what we have targeted. That would be how much, sir? 900 crores to 1,000 crores in standalone.
Could you highlight a little bit on the 2 plants expansion, how far we have come on those and how much capex we have already recurring? How much is planned to be incurred for both plants? And by when, are we expecting the commercialization of Egypt and Mundra plant?
Mundra, we have spent around 130 crores, and we have a balance of 30 crores.
And Egypt, we have spent around 86 crores, and the balance is around 40 crores.
By when are we expecting the commercialization of the plants?
Egypt will be happening very soon, maybe by January. Okay January 2026. And the Mundra plant? Maybe by March.
Okay. And we have positive outlook for the coming 2 years, right? Yes. Of course, yes.
A major growth driver, if you can name, I understand hydrogen is one of the markets we are looking at. What else is going to be the major driver for is, sir?
I think the CNG segment continues to grow. And in the industrial gases, there are a lot of new segments coming up like semiconductor and other things. Definitely, there is going to be growth coming from those areas, solar, semiconductor.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Reet Jain from First Water Global. Please proceed.
Good afternoon, sir. I want to know what is the order book for U.S.A. subsidiary? And the execution time?
U.S.A. is around $80 million. And the execution time is 12-18 months.
And any update on the GST case that was there last year?
Yes, we made some representations to the government. Yes and we are hoping for some positive replies from them soon.
But any timeline like when it will be resolved?
Yes. I mean the is very difficult to put a timeline on these things. But we are quite confident we have a strong case, we are, hopefully, things should be okay.
Because I read somewhere that not only you, but other players have also received the GST order?
Of course, they will, yes. Everybody will who has in the industry will receive it.
Okay. And in the start of the call, you said that you are doing something in defence.
So can you just explain the opportunity? I mean, what exactly we are making there?
We have been catering to defence sector since a long time, and a lot of projects are within the pipeline. I am not able to share those details, but just to let you know that it is looking positive for us, that segment. Sir, do we have orders for them? We have orders for that.
And sir, I mean, are there any competitors for the defence in our segment?
Of course, there are competitors in every sector. But in some areas, maybe there is no competition in some areas, there might be competitors.
Okay. Because I am asking this because to enter into defence, there is a long gestation period.
Yes. That is true.
And one more thing, your employee costs rose from 36 crores in the same quarter previous year to 43 crores now. Can you just comment on that, why the increase?
The other thing is that, of course, as we expand into new product line plus increment, so all these things have probably given this rise.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Vidhi Shah from C R Kothari & Sons Stock Broking. Please proceed.
For standalone business currently, may I know what is your utilization rate? 70%.
Okay. And currently, we are doing 70%, 948 crores of revenue. Is this a peak utilization that we can expect? Or can we expect this to go up utilization?
It can definitely go up. It is only 70%. So at least, I think 20%, we can go up.
Okay. So, there is scope for increasing from current to further 80% potentially? Yes.
Okay. And sir, from the UAE plant, what is the current outlook since in the past, it was not doing well. So, what is the future outlook?
The UAE now, the order book is improving slowly. Hopefully, the coming quarters, the things should be better.
And how are the margins shaping up there?
They will improve. And once the order book is there, then Dubai margins have always been decent because, of course, they do not have a tax also there. So there is definitely better margins. But once the order book is good, then the margins will be better.
And what is the current order book, if I may know? Yes. Sorry, you asked the UAE? For all the locations.
All the locations. You can say about Rs. 1,000 crore. Is this executable over the next 1 year? Yes.
And sir, just one last question. I missed on the earlier participant, you said Mundra, how much balance capex is left out of 130 crore that is spent? 30 crores Okay. And both these plants, Mundra and Egypt, what is the total revenue contribution you are expecting?
We are working on it. Probably in the coming quarters, I think it will be clear.
Because earlier you had mentioned 100 crores from the Egypt plant and 200 crores for the Mundra plant? Yes.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Rakesh Patidar who is an Individual Investor. Please go ahead.
Sir, Reliance recently capex besides like 65,000 crores for the green energy. So recently, we got any order from Reliance?
We are catering to the Reliance, their geo platform for the CNG stations. we are only supplying cascades to them, but their plan on green energy might be hydrogen production and things like that. We are not doing anything there.
And this last quarter, have you added any new client logo in our revenue?
We are always entering new clients, maybe in industrial, definitely, there might be a few clients that have been added.
Okay. For particular this quarter, how much in you expect like overall revenue? We are doing well or under the performance for this quarter?
It is still underway. Quarter is too early to give you some numbers, but it is in line with what we are targeting.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Vivek Gupta, an Individual Investor. Please go ahead.
I had a question regarding the GST issue. What is the status? Has it been resolved? Or what is the way forward?
No, it is still going on. We have made representations to the government, and we have a case in High Court also. Hopefully, we are quite positive that things should be in our favour because already government has just announced revision of the GST reforms.
So we are hopeful that things should be positive. And is this for the entire industry? The entire industry.
The same demands have been made to other players also? Yes.
Thank you. Next follow-up question is from the line of Ashit R. Kothi an Individual Investor. Please go ahead.
Sir, with regards to hydrogen cylinder, basically, it has been of a type 5 or type 6 and whether we have got an approval for the same? Or we are still in the process?
Hydrogen, it all depends on where are you using the cylinders. So it is very specific to where the application is in mobility or is it on the ground storage? It is subject to the application.
Yes, I understand. So what would be our focus area in that?
So definitely, we will go across all product lines in hydrogen once it starts coming up.
We will definitely look at all our products all across from mobility to ground storage to everything.
And even in terms of shipping also, I mean, say, either importing or exporting hydrogen?
Yes, that is probably the different product and different industrial altogether. It is different. We are only looking at mobility and hydrogen transportation within the country.
And sir, how exactly you plan to take care of your working capital requirements once your plans are operational? I think we have adequate limits.
You mean to say that there will not be any pressure on the margin with respect to increasing in interest?
No, there should not be any pressure on margin.
Thank you. Next question is from the line of Bhavin Salot, an Individual Investor. Please proceed.
Sir, I would like to know about the interest and the penalty, which we pay of 11 crores for this quarter. Can you throw some light? Why was that? And will that happen again or not?
This was on account of our not completing net foreign exchange earnings in our plant at - Kasez, which is in SEZ. This was based on a 5-year assessment. In fact, we were awaiting some amendments to this. However, it did not materialize. Therefore, we had to pay a little penalty since we were short on the net foreign exchange earnings.
But will this happen again? Or is this a onetime effect?
No, it may be possible, but we are represented to the government to take us out of the SEZ. It will be, again, reassessed after 5 years. So - you have ample time to either export or get an amendment in the rules.
But is there any chance of this getting waived off.
This does not get waived off. This is already passed as an order. In future, yes, there may be a representation, which may sort of get us the benefit of future.
And one last question. Sir, are we supplying cylinders to Maruti? No, we are not supplying. Okay.
Thank you. Next follow-up question is from the line of Vidhi Shah from C R Kothari & Sons Stock Broking. Please go ahead.
Sir, I wanted to know about the order book for US specifically?
Yes. It is $80 million order book in the U.S.
And the 1,000 crore that you mentioned, that is for India alone? No, that is just a combined number.
And may I know what is the reason for the current drop in margins from 16% last quarter to 12% now?
I think it is just a product mix. That is probably what the dropped in margins.
Which are the higher-margin products versus the lower margin ones?
There are margins in Industrial and CNG, but we had a product, a lot of products that were less margin because we had a drop in some of the high-value products.
Understood. So these new plants, Mundra and Egypt, so they cater to the high-margin industrial and CNG cylinders or the lower margin ones. So like the margins will improve with these plants or it will be in line with what it is currently?
The CNG and it is a mix of products. You have your products for cars, and you have products for commercial vehicles. Sometimes maybe the passenger car products are not so high margin, and maybe some higher-margin products might be in other segments. There will be a mix and it will not be just specific only to high end.
Thank you. As there are no further questions from the participants, I now hand the conference over to the management for the closing comments.
Thank you once again for your interest and support. Should you need any further clarification or would like to know more about the company. Please contact CDR India. Thank you.