Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us for our annual earnings call to discuss the business and financial performance of Fine Organic Industries Limited for the financial year 2025-2026. I hope you have had the opportunity to review our financial results and investor presentation, both of which are available on company's website and stock exchanges.

I am joined today by our Chief Financial Officer, Ms. Sonali Bhadani, along with our investor relations advisors from SGA.

Over the years, we have built a strong and globally recognized specialty additives platform, catering to a diverse range of end-user industries, including foods, plastics, polymers, feed nutrition, personal care, coatings, inks, rubber, and several other industrial applications. Today, our products are supplied to leading domestic and multinational customers across geographies, supported by long-standing customer relationships, strong technical expertise, and consistent focus on quality, reliability, and global regulatory compliances.

What differentiates us is not only the breadth of our product portfolio, but also our ability to develop customized and performance-driven solutions aligned with evolving customer requirements. Our continued investments in innovation, process capability enhancement, application development, and customer engagement have enabled us to steadily strengthen our positioning across the global markets.

We have evolved from being not only a product supplier to becoming a strategic solution partner for several customers globally. This transition has helped us deepen our customer relationships, improve our product stickiness, and expand opportunities across multiple application segments globally.

FY26 was another year characterized by an evolving global macroeconomic environment, heightened geopolitical uncertainties, changing trade dynamics, volatility in raw material prices, and disruptions across global logistics and supply chains. Demand conditions across several international markets continued to remain uneven, while business globally operated in an environment marked by cautious inventory management, freight volatility, currency fluctuations, and supply-side uncertainties.

Despite these external challenges, we continued to demonstrate resilience and stability, supported by our diversified product portfolio, balanced geographic presence, strong customer relationships, and operational discipline, and long-term strategic vision. On the operating front, FY26 continued to witness elevated input cost pressures.

Raw material prices remained higher compared to FY25, primarily driven by volatility in global commodity markets and higher feedstock costs. Additionally, raw material prices witnessed a marginal increase during Q4 of FY26 compared to Q3 FY26.

Freight costs, which had largely stabilized during most part of the year, witnessed an increase during Q4 of FY26 due to disruptions arising from the West Asia conflict and related supply chain uncertainties. Operationally, all our manufacturing facilities continued to run at almost full utilization levels.

Our Patalganga facility, which was commissioned for food additives, has also seen a steady ramp-up, and we expect the plant to operate at full capacity during the next financial year. From a strategic perspective, FY26 has been an important milestone year in our long-term global expansion journey, and multiple initiatives progressing simultaneously across key geographies.

I am pleased to share that board has approved our acquisition of up to 80% stake in Oleofine Organics Sdn. Bhd., Malaysia, also referred to as OFM.

OFM is engaged in manufacturing and sales of food additives, and reported a turnover of approximately Malaysian ringgit 23.3 million, equivalent to approximately ₹44 cr, as of January 31, 2026. This acquisition aligns with our long-term growth strategy, strengthens our presence in the specialty additives space, and further enhances our international footprint in the growing Asian region.

Post completion, OFM will become a subsidiary of Fine Organic Industries Limited. The acquisition will be undertaken through cash consideration, with the aggregate transaction value expected to be approximately Malaysian ringgit 34.2 million, which is approximately ₹82.9 cr, subject to transaction costs and exchange rate variations.

The transaction is expected to be completed within the next three months, subject to customary approvals and definitive agreements. Of the proposed 80% stake, 50% will be acquired from Snubex Chemicals Private Limited, a promoter group entity, while the remaining 30% will be acquired from other existing shareholders of OFM.

The transaction will be carried out on an arm's length basis. During the year, we continued investment in Fine Organic Industries SEZ Private Limited, our wholly owned subsidiary, focused on the upcoming JNPA SEZ manufacturing project in India.

The subsidiary issued preference shares amounting to ₹65 cr as part of its equity capital structure. With this, the total investment made by Fine Organic Industries Limited in the subsidiary stands approximately ₹192.5 crores to date.

We are working actively on the JNPA project, and project execution committee continues progress as per the scheduling. As communicated earlier, we expect the commencement of commercial production sometime during FY28.

The SEZ facility remains a critical pillar of our long-term growth strategy and is expected to strengthen our export manufacturing capabilities, while also creating additional room within existing facilities to cater to the growing domestic demand. One of the key developments during the year was incorporation of a wholly owned subsidiary in Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

The objective of this entity is to establish a stronger local presence across GCC countries and enhance supply chain efficiencies for customers in the West Asian region. During Q4 FY26, we infused equity of 2 lakh dirhams, approximately ₹49.5 lakh, into this subsidiary.

The West Asia continues to emerge as an important market for several specialty applications, and this initiative will help us improve customer engagement, regional responsiveness, and distribution efficiencies across nearby export markets. During the year, we have additionally infused equity of approximately ₹6.17 cr, approximately Thai baht 22.5 million, in our joint venture company, Fine Organic Industries (Thailand) Company Limited, to support future business growth.

We entered United States to set up manufacturing units. We have infused equity investment of approximately US$1.12 million, equivalent to approximately ₹9.6 crore, and subsidiary has acquired around 160 acres of land in Jonesville, Union County in South Carolina.

The US market represents a strategically important geography for us. This will strengthen our presence across North, Central, and South Americas, enhance supply chain security for our customers, and unlock new growth opportunities.

We have received all the necessary approvals for the project and are currently in advanced stage discussions with the contractors. The board has approved the appointment of Mr.

Shailendra Nadkarni as an additional director in the capacity of non-executive independent director for a period of five years, effective May 19, 2026, subject to shareholders' approval. Mr.

Nadkarni brings over three decades of extensive experiences across corporate banking, project finance, retail banking, MSME and agri finance, digital banking, and human resources. During his distinguished tenure at IDBI Bank, including as an executive director from 2018 to 2024, he played a key role in driving digital initiatives, leadership development, and organizational transformation.

We believe his strong expertise in banking, risk management, and strategic leadership will further strengthen company's governance and strategic direction going forward. Overall, the near-term global environmental continues to remain dynamic and uncertain.

We remain confident about the long-term opportunities for the specialty additives industry and for Fine Organics. With that, I would now like to invite Ms.

Sonali Bhadani, our CFO, to walk you through the company's financial performance. Sonali.

Thank you, sir. A very good afternoon to all of you who are joining today.

Let me take you through the company's key consolidated financial performance parameters for the year financial year 2026. The revenues from the operation is up by 4.3% amounting to ₹2,365 cr, from ₹2,269 cr in FY25.

The PAT, profit after tax, for the FY26 was up by 1.6% on a year-on-year basis from basis up to ₹417 cr, as compared to last year ₹410 cr in FY25. The EBITDA margin for the FY26 stood at 20.4%.

With this, I would like to open the floor for question and answers.

Hi, sir. Thanks for the opportunity, and congratulations on a good show in the current macro.

My first question is on the overall RM inflation that we are seeing. Your thoughts in terms of how do you see this space playing out in terms of both the customer demand, if at all there is any impact there, as well as from a supply chain perspective.

Any thoughts there?

Thank you very much. As far as demand is concerned, we don't see any change.

The demand is quite stable. We are facing some supply chain issues, especially for our customers in Middle East, where all the ports are not operative, only some ports are operative.

Now the customers are taking to those ports and then taking it to their site by road and all that, and freight costs have gone up in certain regions. This is all again the customers have accepted to buy on FOB from us.

Because of this situation, all the customers have agreed that they will take all risk for freight, extra charges of freight and other things. That's where we don't see any issues as of now.

We are cautious, we are watching continuously as far as the customer demands are concerned. The costs have definitely gone up, but most of our customers have accepted the new freight rates because they have understood even though we had certain contracts, but those people also understood the situation and they are cooperative with us.

I don't see any issues as of now there. Raw material, yes, the prices are going up.

Because of the increase in the crude oil prices, the demand for vegetable oils has gone up globally. For example, the palm oil which is still come from Indonesia and Malaysia, there the impact is coming stronger because the Indonesia has decided to use 50% of the palm oil in biodiesel to mix with their diesel and petrol and all that.

Availability has reduced. Similar thing happened in Malaysia.

They are now at about 15%, but they may also increase. I believe that palm oil prices will continue to increase till this war issue is over.

Other vegetable oils, following the palm, will also probably increase. I don't see raw material prices coming down in near future till this issue is completely sorted out.

We are fortunately we have great customers, very nice customers, they are quite cooperative, and we are also not taking very large long-term orders. We are taking very short-term orders, maybe month or two, and customers are quite cooperative.

They understand the situation and they are very much cooperating with us. We are quite confident to go through this, and we have not stopped.

This crisis has not stopped us from going ahead with further expansions. Now, with this Malaysian venture is also going to be with us, we have a lot of plans for that unit also.

SEZ, we are working on full swing. We are trying to start it as early as possible.

US is also definitely we will go there. Only thing, right now the discussions are going on.

We are very positive for our growth plans.

Sure, Mukesh bhai. That was very helpful.

Just the second question on our expansion plans. While you did highlighted the JNPA expansion as well as the US plans, if you can share some thoughts, one, in terms of what could be the opportunity size here, especially on the US side, wherein we have got sort of 160 acres there.

How big, or in terms of capacity, in terms of revenue, whichever way, what are the expansion plans there, and by what timeframe can we look at? Similar thoughts on the Thailand plant as well, wherein we had done some pilot testing for food additives, but wanted to scale up subject to the response.

Your thoughts there.

That's right, that's right. As far as US is concerned, there's no point in putting up a small plant there.

It has to be the world-scale plant. We know that we don't have any experience in running the plant in US so far.

Plus, this is 100% owned Fine Organics company, there is no joint venture. That first step, we expect some issues, some problems we may face.

What we have decided that we will have little conservative capacity in the first phase, so that we can manage the smaller problems which we may come across in the first one or two years. As far as the market demand is concerned, we are not worried at all.

What we are worried probably is that running the plant efficiently and running the business successfully there with the initial hiccups and all these things. We are a little bit concerned.

That is why we are going little cautiously in the first phase. After first phase, it will be much bigger.

Second phase will be much bigger, third will be much bigger. We have as of now, we have plans for at least three stages as of now, but we will start walking before we start running.

This is US expansion. Thailand JV, yes, we want to go for that, but right now our team is extremely busy in SEZ plant.

We don't want to delay that expansion, we have requested Thailand people to bear with us for few months till our team gets a little bit free from SEZ, and then we can send them to Thailand. They are cooperating with us.

Right now the Thailand plant is running at full scale. We want to expand there as well, and that expansion, it will involve a lot of manpower from our side for the project and engineering and all these things at the beginning.

If I send them to Thailand, my expansion in SEZ may get delayed. I don't want to take any risk, and I have told them, and they have readily agreed.

They said, "Okay, we'll wait for few months till you are free, and then the Thailand is definitely going to be there." Meanwhile, this Malaysia is also in queue now.

[laughter] So we have a lot of things to do. Everybody is very busy, and we are trying to take up everything coming out.

We have very less number of people compared to the expansions coming up, but everybody is geared up, everybody is charged up, and everybody is working hard except me. That's I think it's going to be there.

We need to have a little bit of patience. We don't want to make a blunder, especially in US and in SEZ.

Great, sir. Thanks a lot for your detailed reply.

Congratulations and all the best for the expansion. Thank you.

Thank you.

Thanks for the opportunity, and congrats on a strong sequential recovery. Sir, first question just from the earlier participant, in terms of the investment for our SEZ plant, what kind of initial investments that we are planning and in terms of potential revenues that we are looking at?

Similarly, for the US plant, and if you've explained there'll be three phases, but what could be the potential investment in the first phase that we are looking at in terms of maybe amount or capacity? Thank you.

As far as SEZ investment is concerned, we have already announced it last year. SEZ investment is approximately 700 to ₹750 cr.

That is the first phase we have already announced, and we will build some base for the phase two also. Majority of the 750 cr will go into the first phase capex, and some basic investment for second phase.

As far as US investment is concerned, we are still to announce. Probably within next quarter we will be able to give you the right figure, because as of now, the discussions with a lot of contractors are going on, and their contracts are not yet finalized.

A lot of discussions are going on. Once these figures are freezed, then probably we should be able to.

I think by next quarter we should be ready with the US investment figures also.

Sure. On the SEZ front, ₹700, ₹750 crores, what kind of revenue potential that we're looking at?

No idea, my friend, no idea. As of now, no idea.

We know what we are going to do there, what we're going to make there, but the prices are so volatile as of now, it is impossible to predict anything. At the right time we will announce that.

As of now, we are totally focused only on the starting of this SEZ facility. Once we achieve that, then probably, yes, we will have some idea to share with you.

Right, got it, sir. Sir, second question is on the Oleofine Organics, which is being acquired.

Congratulations for that. You indicated the turnover has been close to about some 40-odd crores.

What are the plans there in terms of scaling up this,

given

that they'll be existing products? Yeah.

Yes. It is a very old company which since 1988, I believe, and the products what we make there are completely based on palm-based raw materials.

We have yet to acquire. We're going to acquire within next three months.

The revenue is approximately ₹54 cr as of now, and there is a lot of scope of expansion there. That is the reason we have acquired this 80% share.

We have a lot of things to do there as well, but everything will be palm-based there. As of now, they are only in food additives mainly, but going forward, after doing the investment, we will expand into other lines also.

Of course, the foods will be always there because it's palm-based.

Right. Do we have the exports from this Malaysian venture to the US currently?

Are we planning to incrementally do that till the time the US site is not up?

No, no, as of now, from Malaysia, there is no export to US. Major exports is to Asian countries like Indonesia, China, Vietnam, those kind of country, mostly Asian markets.

Something going to Pakistan and by all those small, small countries nearby. Yes, after expansion, there would be some products going to other markets also.

US, not immediate chances for the first phase, because we are planning to start manufacturing in US only the products required for US. Probably from OFM, US exports will not be so much, maybe a little bit here and there, but not much.

Mainly, it will be Asian region.

Sure, sir. Thanks a lot and all the best.

Thank you.

Thanks for the opportunity. Good evening, Mukesh bhai.

My first question is on the JNPT timeline. You indicated as somewhere in FY28.

Can you be a little bit more details, probably it will be in the early '28 or at the end of the '28? How confident are you about this timeline, because I'm sure most of this pending work would be in your controllable.

Are you very confident that we will be starting this plant within the timeline, within whatever the timeline? How about the product approvals for this site?

Do we have to do it again right from the beginning, or it's largely the same customers?

Arun bhai, we are trying very hard to start it as early as possible, but we believe that we will be able to start at least in the second half of 2028. As far as the products approvals are concerned, there's no issue about product approvals, because initially we are going to make the product which we are already exporting, because this plant is in SEZ area, and whatever we produce will be exported.

Initially, our plan is in the first phase at least to transfer the production what we are already exporting currently in our existing plants to this SEZ plant and start exports right away. That is the first phase.

The approval and other things are not necessary, except maybe there will be one or two Japanese or US or those kind of very large companies who may come here for a formal approval because we are changing the site, although the chemistry, process, and everything is going to be same in the first phase. According to their process audit or whatever, they will come for a formal approval, but 98% of other buyers will not bother.

Only some two, three large customers may come for this audit approval or whatever their procedural approval, which is basically the formality. We don't see any issues coming up in SEZ as of now, and everything is as of now moving quite fast and as per our schedule.

We have got very nice agencies working on this, and I was there last week to see, and I was very happy to see that it is going on. As of now, there is no other approvals are also pending from government's side.

Maybe we will have to face one or two more approvals once we come closer to the commissioning stage, but as of now there's not an issue there.

Understood. Sir, on our US plant, we got land almost of the similar timeline as that of JNPT, but we are still on the contractor finalization.

Is this because of the volatile US policies, and do you see the US manufacturing policy is now closer to reality, or do you need some more clarification from the local government to go ahead?

See, Arun bhai, local government is more than cooperative. They are really helpful, very, very helpful, I must say, and very positive, very supportive in all respects.

Only thing initially we faced the issue when they imposed 50% import duty and all that. That was making it little bit shaky at that time, but we knew that this is going to be temporary, we patiently waited for them to get clarification.

Now the duty factor is always there, but it is not a very big factor. I think 10, 15% is there, but that's okay, that's not a very big issue.

Of course, it will impact the cost, but there is no other way, because everybody has 10%, 15% duty, that's not too bad. After calculating on 50%, we think 10, 15% is acceptable.

We are not worried of tariff or other such things. We are not delaying anything for that.

We are going ahead with that. Tariff is not really an issue now.

Once we finalize these contractors, which our other team is working on full swing with them, we would like to start the activities there, the construction we would like to start there.

Understood. You said earlier this US plant will be of world scale.

That would be, I'm assuming, at the end of the final phase. After the final phase, would that be as big as our current SEZ plant or relatively how?

No, Arun bhai, we will we will start only the first phase together, first phase. We will not because we we believe that we may face some problems because we are totally not experienced in US operations in US.

We we may face certain issues in first two years. We would like to settle out all these you know sort it out all these things and make it smooth to work before we go for the bigger investment in phase two.

First phase, we will be little conservative, but still, conservative means it is not that small, but comparatively, compared to the second and third phase, it will be little conservative. There, again, the sales will not be an issue for the first phase because we have the ready market, customers, approvals, everything is there.

We are very positive about the US plant at least for the phase one.

Understood. Just one clarification.

When you say phase one, that capacity will be approximately half of our JNPT, 1/3? What is the broad?

I will not give any production capacity figures. I've told you earlier also.

Not in absolute terms, just in a relative manner.

It is not in the interest of the company. Although we are aware of the first phase, we are aware of the second phase also, but I would not like to mess up that.

No problem. Mukesh bhai, one final question on Malaysia.

I'm sure that you would have thought about this, but seems like the acquisition is very small one as compared to our scale, 45 crores of revenue. Maybe, I'm assuming, even with a 20% margin, it's a 10 crore cash flow plant.

Given that we have too much in our plate, how this is helpful at this juncture?

Arun bhai, I understood your point. Don't forget that this is a strategic decision, because you are situated in the right place.

This is basically for oleochemical derivatives. Palm oil is the most important thing.

India does not have that. There are certain big advantages there in Malaysia, and we have taken that decision.

We are definitely going to expand there in a sizable way. That is the reason we have taken over.

We were not interested in this small facility, but we are looking at the big projections in the future coming up. Malaysia definitely is going to be an important one for us.

This company has lot of land?

It does not have a lot of land, but existing land is enough for us to start with at least something and make it little sizable one to start with, with a specialty product, specially based on palm and palm kernel oil, some high-value products and all that. We are focusing only on that as of now.

Understood, sir. Understood.

Thank you, sir. All the best, and I'll get back in queue.

Thank you, Arun bhai.

Hi, sir. Good evening.

Thank you for the opportunity. Sir, first on the raw materials, more specifically on ammonia, which is a critical input for several of your product categories.

Ammonia has been in tight supply. My question is whether Fine Organics has experienced any disruption in ammonia availability because of this?

As of now, no, Nitesh bhai. As of now, we have some storage capabilities and other thing, but so far there is no issue.

We have tie-ups with our suppliers and all that. Far there is nothing.

If this war prolongs further, and probably as the government keeps on saying, it could affect. As of now, we are fine.

Sure. Sir, and what is your current read on whether FY27 could be the year where the macro setup starts to mirror the earlier cycle that we had seen in FY23, given the demand supply environment?

Is this a similar tightening that we're seeing on the global oleochemical supply chain, similar to what we had seen in FY23?

Supply chain is affected everywhere, there is no doubt about it. It is because the oleochemical supply chain mostly is from Asia as of now, and in India we have other oils available, but majority for that is the freight cost and everything has gone up, but as of now there is no problem.

Going forward, I anticipate some short supplies, particularly for palm oil, because if the crude oil prices continue to go up, the use of biodiesel will increase, and use of biodiesel will take away a lot of vegetable oils from the market. The prices may go up.

It will not be that oil will not be available, not like that, but the prices may go up, that's what I see. So '27, I'm sure, considering even if the war is over, it will going to take few more months to get everything stable.

I would say that in '27, we should not expect lower price of raw materials, especially vegetable oils. It will continue to be on a higher level only.

We have to be a little careful in FY27. Sure.

That's helpful. Sir, and on the capital work-in-progress on your consolidated balance sheet, while you were referring to the work that is going on on the SEZ site, but the balance sheet is not reflecting any significant increase as of March '26.

Typically, once the civil and the construction activity commences, we would expect the CWIP to start building up meaningfully. Could you help us reconcile this?

Specifically, has there been any spend on the on-ground construction, or has it been primarily on the land and the approvals and the subsidiary infusions there? Just trying to gauge the actual pace of execution, and whether the FY28 commissioning timeline would be largely met.

Hi, Nitesh. Sonali this side.

We have started spending, and we have onboarded the contractors on the SEZ site, and the advances has been released. This has happened very recently, and I think the meaningful number which you are looking for, you will see in the coming quarters.

Sure. Ma'am, probably if you can give us some timelines as to whether we can commission in the first half of FY28 or wouldn't be towards the end of '28?

Second half, I think.

That Mukesh bhai already told that it will be somewhere later in FY.

Second half '28 will be possible, according to me. All right.

All right. Just one more question, ma'am, here.

On the employee costs, even after stripping out the 7 crore one-time gratuity provision related to the new labor codes, the underlying employee cost growth is approximately 16% in FY26, against a backdrop of a 4% revenue growth and a relatively soft performance for the year. Could you help us understand how much of this is routine annual increments, and how much reflects strategic hiring, whether for the SEZ project team or the US subsidiary or the global entities, the new ones, like Dubai and Malaysia?

Not for Dubai and Malaysia, I think the strategic hiring has been started for our SEZ plant, which is going to come up, because those people, by the time the plant is ready, they should be trained, fully trained, and then they could be transferred to that particular company. That is there.

I do not have exact breakups to that, but out of that employee cost, there is something which includes our directors' salary also. It includes all employees and directors' salaries and the new hirings.

Whatever opportunities Mukesh bhai has discussed, I think the strategic hiring is including everything, because the project team, all other teams needs to be strengthened, the bandwidth needs to be improved, because as we jump on all these opportunities.

For FY27, could we expect a similar or probably a higher rate there in terms of the increase in employee costs?

Something similar, yes. Out of which, this gratuity part is 7 cr, you can keep it aside, because that is one time which we had taken.

Something similar, because our hiring will keep on going on for next one year also across, because people need to be get trained here and then move to the respective locations.

Got it, ma'am. Just one last on the tax.

I'll get back in the queue. Thank you.

Thank you.

Hi, sir. Am I audible?

Yes.

Okay. Sir, a few questions.

Once construction starts in the US, how long would it take for phase one to complete?

Where, in SEZ?

In the US.

In the US? What do you mean

Phase one completion?

Phase one. Phase one?

Yeah.

Once we start, I think then we can give you the timelines.

Because right now we have not yet started the construction. Right now we have procured the land and we are finalizing the contractors and other requirements.

Once we start the construction, the plant should be commissioned within 18 to 24 months. We will try for 18 months, most likely.

Got it. Sir, given that we are in a raw material price inflation scenario, is there any change in the length of the company's contracts with our clients?

Raw material price scenario what? Sorry, I could not

Sir, given that the raw material price is increasing, is there any change in the length of the company's contracts with our clients?

Since this war started somewhere in February, March, and since then we have been very cautious. We although the raw material prices are going up and it will go, as I told you earlier, the raw material prices will remain higher at least in 2027.

We are very cautious in making customer contracts. Whatever contracts were there, we completed before that, fortunately.

There are some still small, small contracts might be there, but most of the customers are very cooperative. We don't see any much issue, and right now we have told the customers that we will not be able to make long-term contracts because of this unstable situation.

The large companies, they all understand and they are all fully cooperative. They are saying that, "Okay, let us do for one month, two month, three month, whatever is possible."

They are cooperating with us. We don't have that problem so much as of now.

Got it, sir. Short-term contracts is what we're looking at.

Sir, are we expanding our product portfolio currently? Have we added any new divisions, and how is the progress in the surfactants division?

As of now, all the plants are running at almost the full capacity. Product portfolio is a different way.

The R&D continues to develop the new products, new applications, those developments are going on. Yes, there are a lot of developments going on, but as you say, in our kind of products, it doesn't start immediately, because then it goes for regulatory approvals and a lot of other approvals before the customer approvals.

It is a long-term process. We believe that we have already done several developments and they are slowly progressing, and we hope that some of these products will be available when we have spare extra capacity available after one and a half year, two years.

Okay. Sir, finally, in India, are we seeing how is the demand situation been in the current year, especially with inflation starting to creep up?

See, prices have gone up, and as of now, demand, we don't see any drop as of now, because, you see, our products are used in a very small quantity, typically 0.1 to 0.5%, and they are added to the performance additives. These are not commodity kind of products.

These are absolutely performance-oriented products, and people, when they make certain products, they require basic some performance. We are not affected.

Although the prices of products are going on, but we have not seen any customers stopped using the product, or taking any people going bankrupt or something, nothing of that sort, at least in our to customers here. Every customer is, in fact, expanding in India.

Okay.

India is a very positive development is going on. In spite of all the challenges, the growth continues in India.

Okay. All right.

Thank you, sir. This was very helpful.

I'm done.

Hi. Thanks for the opportunity, sir.

My first question was on your existing plants. The day when your JNPA starts to scale up, because you will shift some products on the SEZ plant, just wanted to take your understanding on the facility which gets vacated in your Ambernath plant.

How soon should we think of catering to incremental demand from the existing plant, if you could share some thoughts?

Yes, yes, of course. When the products are transferred to SEZ, it will be for the products which were continuously regularly exporting.

SEZ plant, it will fill up much faster, because it's already the sales is already existing, most of them. That is not going to be an issue.

By the time, as I told you, the Indian markets are doing very well, and we will continue, once we get this spare capacity, we know the opportunities, we have the customers, we have the approvals and all other things, and I'm sure that even so the new capacity what we get in existing plant will also start getting filled up faster. It's a good situation, I believe.

We are continuously working on that. We know that what we are going to make after the plants we get extra capacity, and we are already prepared for that.

I don't see much challenges in that, filling up that plant

with the

for the domestic sales.

Perfect, sir. This was very helpful.

My second question is, you mentioned that the Thailand team is waiting for our manpower to get freed up. Is this our right understanding that the Thailand's expansion and probably adding new lines in Malaysia would probably come before phase one of JNPA, or this will be after?

No. That's not that, because these are smaller one.

JNPA is the top priority, then SEZ US plant. When US plants start, the team is totally different.

When SEZ team is free, they will focus on Thailand and Malaysia.

Sir, but can that facility expansion in Thailand and

It's a follow-up. It's a follow-up.

Sir,

Thank you.

Yes, sir. Am I audible?

Very not audible.

Can you use the handset? Your voice is very disturbing.

Hello, am I audible now?

Now, yeah, okay.

Yeah. I would like to ask, how are we differentiating ourselves from our peers like Kerry Group, DSM, Palsgaard, in terms of technology, innovation, or the customer relationships?

How are we better than them or a difference in them?

Yes. Say, you said about Kerry.

Kerry is a very large dairy conglomerate, Irish dairy conglomerate, and they are in so many other businesses related to food, and maybe something from non-food also, they're starting with the milk and a lot of other things. We are competing with Kerry only in the one small segment of emulsifiers, nothing else.

Otherwise, Kerry has hydrocolloids, Kerry has a lot of flavors and a lot of other things. We don't think that Kerry is our peer, actually.

We are just a competitor to them for some particular line of emulsifiers, nothing more than that. Similar situation is with Palsgaard.

Palsgaard is like us, they are more focused on emulsifiers, like us. You can compare us with Palsgaard, and Palsgaard is more than 140 or something years old company.

Very, very nice company, very, very good company based in Nordic. It's a great company, I would say.

We learn a lot from them. They are very good in confectionery.

Their specialty is confectionery, chocolates and confectionery. They are probably the world's best.

We are also learning from them. We are better in certain lines, they are better than us in certain lines.

It's a very good company. We work very closely with them, and we know each other very well.

We meet each other very well. We exchange some ideas, and it's a very nice company to work with.

We both learn from each other. It's a good company to work with.

You can connect us more with the Palsgaard rather than Kerry. DSM and other things you told me, they are totally different.

They are not our peers.

Furthermore, I would like to ask, have we done the product approval for the domestic customers, since more manufacturing will be catered to the domestic customers which will be used to the export earlier? Also, my another question would be, are we planning to do any co-creation or co-development with the US expansion we are doing or with the JNPA SEZ in these recent expansions or subsidiaries that we are taking?

Are we planning to do any type of co-creation, co-collaboration? These are my main two questions.

See,

product approval from domestic customers, we already have the product approval, except for the new product. Now, suppose new products tomorrow we are going to introduce in market for domestic, then we have to go for those approvals.

Otherwise, for all our existing products, we already have global approvals from most of the domestic customers, the large ones, small ones, medium ones, all of them. We don't have that issue.

For the new product, we will have to go for the product approval first, after the regulatory approval first, of course. We don't see any challenges, at least in India the approvals are getting much faster, but wherever the headquarters is in Europe or US or other countries, there it gets little slower because they have to depend on their headquarters to get the approvals and all that.

That's okay. We have done all this work for the US customers we've already got it done for last many years.

There we are in a good position, and that's why we're going to put up the plant there. As far as the co-development with customers are concerned, yes, for some large companies, we do have co-development project where they have a confidence in Fine Organics and we work under the non-disclosure agreement.

We have quite a few such cases where we develop products specifically tailor-made to suit their requirements. Yes, those cases are also there, and we like those type of co-development work because we also learn a lot from them.

All right, sir. I would like to cover up with one last question.

For ammonia and other

Sir, am I audible? Yes.

Sir. Over the years, we have been constantly doing R&D, but the capacity has been stagnant for us.

We must have developed a lot of new products. Is there any particular new product that you're most excited about?

Sir, which new product?

New product which you are excited about.

Sorry?

New product. Or

any new industry like the beauty and personal care or the animal feed segment, any products in those industries that most excited about and which can scale up to a big level in the future?

Eshwar, in our line, I'm very much afraid of getting excited about the new products, because if I get very excited, then sometimes the regulatory does not approve that. I have to keep my fingers crossed.

Once we develop the product, first we go through the approvals. We get little bit excited when we get regulatory approvals.

Then yes, you are saying. Then second again we get little bit more excited when the customer approves.

Then finally, when the commercial production starts, then we say, "Yes, now we are fine." That excitement is actually divided into four, five different segments.

There is not a big excitement, but small, small excitement coming in two, three, four years. This is how it is happening in our kind of.

I'm sorry to disappoint you by cutting of this excitement levels, but this is what is the reality in our business. New industry and opportunities you are talking about, there are lots of opportunities.

If I tell you the kind of industries we are working with, you will laugh. There are so many things are going on, which are crazy things are going on.

Of course, we may not be successful with all of them, but yes, there are definitely a lot of opportunities are there. People now want everything based on the safe chemistry, green chemistry, and that is where we have an edge over others.

We have a lot and lot of opportunities coming to us. Our R&D is very busy in developing so many new products and applications.

We are continuously appointing new people with the new skills and new expertises in our R&D. Lots of things are going on, but I can only tell you something, once we get crystallized, something where we see that, yeah, now it is getting commercialized.

Now, for example, the last thing which we did was expanding the feed nutrition division, which was not there earlier. It started only in 2018, '19, and then now it is going very well right now.

That is where we feel very happy that small division we started with one product, now is having 14, 15 products, all getting commercialized, and getting into so many new fields and applications. It is definitely happening, but it's a slow process.

It's not like something very fast. It's a very, very slow process, but it is happening.

Understood. Understood, sir.

My second question was, the past two, three years, have there been any domestic customers that we were not able to cater to because of the constrained capacity that we'll be catering to once the Ambernath exports move to JNPA SEZ? How fast do you expect to fill up this remaining capacity in Ambernath?

No, Eshwar, we are very much experienced in facing this kind of short supply situations. This is not first time to us.

We have devised already the system for that. What we do is we give our domestic customers a priority.

The export customers, we explain them very well. We convince them to buy a little bit less from us.

They are ready to cooperate, they help us out. Then whenever we have extra material, we go to them.

Whatever we do, I must have told them all these things two years ago that I'm going to have this issue in this year, please buy a little bit less from me, whatever best you can buy. Then they help us.

My domestic customers will never, never, never face any short supplies.

Sir. Thank you.

That's all the questions, sir.

Hi, Mukesh bhai.

Namaste.

I didn't have any question for this quarter or this year really, but I had more a kind of a view over last several years. When I think over last six, seven years, there was a dramatic period of 2022-23 when top line really dramatically upsurged, as well as the profits went really dramatically up, both in terms of the size of the profits as well as the percentage margin.

If you leave aside that one or two-year period, and then I see the picture over last six, seven years, our turnover is grown at the rate of 11, 12%. Our operating profits also have grown somewhat at the similar pace.

Last three years in particular, actually have been a kind of a very low growth and a degrowth in the profits. What do you assess of this?

Is this the nature of activity where wide variety of products, specialty products, custom-built products, geographies, multiple applications, and long approval cycle, development time, our long-term predictable growth is likely to be more like these 8-10%, or do we think that this period is a special one? Yes,

Bharat bhai, what you said is correct. That period, what you told, 2022-23, that was just after COVID or something.

At that time, there was a lot of supply chain disruptions, and fortunately, we had all the stocks of raw materials and we could manage supply chain much better than anybody else compared to our competition in US and Europe. That is why that I would consider as just one of the year where we got highest profit.

It was not a normal year for us. It was definitely the best year what we had, but that was because of the prudent steps what we took of storing up all the raw materials required, which we were anticipating there's going to be the supply chain issues, and fortunately, we were right.

I don't think we should consider that as a benchmark year. That was just one of the year.

It was just one of the year. I would say, sustainable EBITDA limit, as we have been telling, if you would have met me earlier in any other investor meetings, I have been always telling our investors that our sustainable EBITDA is in the range of 18 to 20% 20%.

That is based on the last 10 years record, if you see officially. We have never targeted any particular EBITDA, but this has a few actually come into that.

So 18 to 20% probably is the sustainable, and you should look at it at least till now. I do not know about US plant and after SEZ plant and all these things, I'm not able to tell you.

As of now, I would say, if you ask me, my sustainable EBITDA is 18 to 20%. Now, what you said that the growth is limited.

Yes, the growth is limited because our plants are running at full capacity. Even since last year, I've been telling our investors that my two years are going to be flat, absolutely flat, because I cannot add any additional capacity.

This was expected. There is nothing wrong in according to me.

We have told people very clearly. Even next year is going to be the flat year, not only this year, even the next year is going to be flat, because all my other plants are running at full capacity, then what is the point, how can I achieve the growth?

It is not possible only. One more year is going to be flat.

After that, yes, the growth will start coming once the SEZ plant is commissioned, and then the US plant commissioned, then the growth will come. At least till 2028, definitely the growth is not going to be there.

EBITDA, we will try to be between 18 to 20%. If the raw material prices are not going up haywire, which, of course, the raw material price will be higher, but it will not go totally completely out of control.

I'm quite hopeful that 18 to 20% we should be able to maintain even in the worst situation. Because that is based on the historical data.

No, no,

Mukesh bhai, that part you have always maintained, in fact, you have done little better than that over the 10-year period, where typically 20% or little better than that has been, in general, the profitability we have maintained. My key point was really about the growth rate.

You are saying even for '26-27, '27-28, meaningful top-line growth is unlikely.

Yes, it is going to be very flat, let me be very clear. It's going to be very flat till the SEZ plant is commissioned.

It is going to be flat. Even if you see some top-line growth, it will be because of the price increase, not because of any sales growth.

Right. Going beyond

No, I just seek to complete this question, relating to this question. After '28, what kind of picture, Mukesh bhai, do you think would prevail?

Sorry?

After '28.

After 2028.

After '28, too early to tell you, because right now we are focused only on starting the plants, not on this revenue and all those figures and all that. We don't look at it.

We are just focused only on starting the plants. First is SEZ, and second is US.

We are just after that. Once the plant starts, automatically the growth will come.

Sure. Sure.

Thank you, Mukesh bhai, and I'll talk to you later. Alright,

thank you.

Yeah.

Yeah. Hi, sir.

Just I have recently started tracking a company recently. Just noticed a similar trend that between so even if I just take between FY26 to in FY22 to '26, absolute growth has been 25%, and historically, there appears to be a pattern where we have taken a capex, and then followed by 1 to 2 years of strong growth, and then there is relatively another phase of relatively flat growth until these capacities are optimally utilized.

Given we generally have the good visibility on approvals, demand, and the ability to sell incremental volume, in hindsight, do you think that whatever the capex that we are doing, this could have been preponed, and instead of going through a phased expansion, we could have been on a more continuous capex expansion spree? Want to get your thoughts on this.

Yes, yes,

yes. We already tried to do that, but unfortunately, our land acquisition got delayed in Gujarat.

The Gujarat government delayed it for more than one year. We selected the land, we paid for the earnest money deposit.

It was a how many acres land? 100 acres?

100 acres land we had selected in Dholera, and we were very much hopeful, we prepared everything. This I'm talking about two years ago or more?

Two years, two, three, two years ago? Yeah.

Two years ago. After one year, they said that, "Sorry, we can't give you the land."

That delayed our expansion for one year, one and a half years. That is what, but now it is a Gujarat government.

Everybody was talking that Gujarat government is very friendly for investors and business and all that. Even today in the newspapers, they sing about Gujarat government, but we got totally different experience of Gujarat government.

We got actually delayed by them. This is what has happened.

Sure. One more thing,

just a request. That policy, because they did not want chemical companies to come into that section, they wanted to reserve it for semiconductors or automobiles or electrics and all.

It was a policy decision, it's okay, but we would have been happy if they would have told us earlier. Then we wouldn't have been delayed, but right now we are delayed.

Sure, sure, sure. Just one more thing, just a request from my side that, if you could hold at least half-yearly calls, and instead of quarterly, that's just one request.

Sorry?

We are already doing a call post AGM also. Post AGM also, I think, anybody can join us there.

There's no much, as a such updates as of to give it. We will definitely consider your request and we'll think over it.

Yes. Thanks,

thanks.

Thank you.

Sir, thanks for taking my question. Sir, there's been a significant increase in depreciation on a quarter-on-quarter basis, I think from 14 crores to 18 crores in your consol numbers.

Why has depreciation increased despite the company not adding any commercial capacity?

We have added few things in past one or two years. Our R&D has expanded.

We have got one corporate office also coming up, which should be soon capitalized. There have been few additions and some warehouses also which we have added on.

Not the capacities, but other kind of expansions as the company grow has also been done during couple of years.

I'm talking about quarter-on-quarter trend, ma'am, from December quarter to March quarter. It has gone up by 4 crores, approximately 30%, 25%.

On the depreciation?

Correct. In December quarter, which is third quarter, it was 14 crores, and now in fourth quarter, it is 18 crores.

That is also because of the other Ind AS-related adjustments which we have to do on the new leases.

Ma'am. Thank you.

Thank you very much, everyone. I hope we have been able to answer all your questions satisfactorily.

However, if you need any further clarifications or want to know more about the company, please contact the SGA team, our investor relations advisors. Thank you very much.

Thank you.