Godrej Agrovet Limited (GODREJAGRO) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to Godrej Agrovet Limited Q3 FY '25 Earnings Conference Call hosted by PhillipCapital. [Operator Instructions] I now hand the conference over to Mr. Harmish Desai from PhillipCapital. Thank you. And over to you, sir.

Thank you, Ms. Khan. Good afternoon, everyone, and thank you for joining us on the Godrej Agrovet Q3 FY '25 Earnings Conference Call. From the management, we have Mr. Nadir Godrej, Chairman; Mr. Balram S. Yadav, Managing Director; Mr. S. Varadaraj, Chief Financial Officer; and Arijit Mukherjee, Chief Operating Officer, Astec LifeSciences. We would like to begin the call with brief opening remarks from the management, following which we will open the forum for a Q&A session. Before we start, I would like to point out that some statements made in today's call may be forward-looking, and a disclaimer to that effect has been included in the earnings presentation shared with you earlier. I would now like to invite Mr. Nadir Godrej to make the initial remarks. Thank you.

Continued to deliver strong profit growth in quarter 3 fiscal year '25, fueled by robust performance in the Vegetable Oil, Animal Feed and Poultry businesses. While revenue growth was moderate, EBITDA margins excluding nonrecurring items improved in quarter 3 fiscal year '25 by 200 basis points as compared to quarter 3 fiscal year '24. Coming to the financial and business highlights of each of our business segments. In the Animal Feed segment, margins improved sharply from 4% in quarter 3 fiscal year '24 to 6% in quarter 3 fiscal year '25 on account of favorable commodity position. Further, our EBIT per metric tonne significantly improved by 45% from INR 1,338 in quarter 3 fiscal year '24 to INR 1,935 in quarter 3 fiscal year '25. Quarter 3 fiscal year '25 also saw a 10% sequential volume jump driven by cattle, broiler and layer feed, while overall volume growth compared to quarter 3 fiscal year '24 was marginal. Our Vegetable Oil segment in quarter 3 fiscal year '25 delivered strong results with significant profit growth driven by higher crude palm oil, CPO and palm kernel oil, PKO prices and an improved oil extraction ratio or OER. This also reflected in a 45% year-on-year increase in segment revenue despite flat fresh fruit bunch arrivals. In quarter 3 fiscal year '25, segment revenue and margins in the stand-alone Crop Protection business were adversely impacted by lower sales volumes in the in-license category. This decline was primarily due to localized extreme weather events in key markets and subdued crop prices. Astec made significant progress in quarter 3 fiscal year '25, reducing its EBITDA losses to INR 4 crores from INR 18 crores in the previous quarter and INR 17 crores in quarter 3 fiscal year '24. The improved performance was primarily due to higher volumes in the CDMO business, which helped offset the impact of lower realizations in the key enterprise products. The company expects this positive momentum to continue in the coming quarters. In quarter 3 fiscal year '25, our Dairy segment saw steady performance in segment revenue and margin. We continue to see positive movement in value-added products which reached 34% of total sales, improving both year-on-year and sequentially. In our Poultry business, quarter 3 fiscal year '25 revenue was marginally lower year-on-year, primarily due to a deliberate reduction in Live Bird business volumes as the company continued its strategic shift towards the branded segment. However, profitability improved significantly in quarter 3 fiscal year '25, primarily driven by higher Live Bird prices. GAVL's joint venture in Bangladesh, ACI Godrej recorded decline in revenues of 13% year-on-year in quarter 3 fiscal year '25 due to the ongoing economic challenges and political instability in Bangladesh. This concludes our business and financial performance update for the quarter. With this, I close my opening remarks. We will be now happy to answer your questions. Thank you.

[Operator Instructions] The first question is from the line of Abhijit from Kotak Securities.

So my first question pertains to Astec LifeSciences. We have expected a significant increase in CDMO revenues this year. I believe in the past, we have guided to about INR 400 crores for the year, about 50% growth. So just in the context of how the year has unfolded, if you could please update us on what your current expectations are, both for the remainder of this year and then for fiscal '26, please?

Yes. This is Arijit. So this year, in fact, if you see the guidance earlier, we have told that CDMO year-on-year will grow around 30% to 40%. So we stick to that. This year is a little bit -- it has been less one because of price correction and some molecules have not come because of the -- more of a market situation. In terms of '26, we have done the basic meeting with most of the CDMO players. So as of now, which we feel almost all the projects are coming back to the normal scale. In fact, the volume projections we are getting till date is the normal volume projections we see. Prices will be very difficult to say right now. But what we can see from China, bottom out is over now. So prices are either stabilizing or a little bit showing a little bit increase. So our guidance remains that year-on-year, we will be growing at 40%.

And my second question is with regard to the Animal Feed segment. The EBIT per tonne has expanded quite sharply in the first 3 quarters of this year. How much of this is sustainable? And what should we look for margins to be in coming quarters, maybe for fiscal '26 overall?

So I think the EBIT in this quarter has been about INR 1,935 -- INR 1,935 per tonne. I must also say that it is because of some raw material situation has been benign, but there are a lot of other initiatives also, particularly from R&D and margin expansion initiatives through cost, which have also resulted in this increase. The kind of coverage we have and the initiatives we have in the pipeline, we believe that we will be able to get EBIT of over INR 2,100 in Q4. If you ask me, if we are able to hold on to all the benefits which we have got this year, apart from raw material, we should be able to hold on to INR 1,800 to INR 2,000 per tonne in FY '26 also.

Okay. That's helpful. And just one last thing for me, if I may. On the stand-alone Crop Protection business, where things seem to have gotten a little bit challenging in the last couple of quarters because of various reasons. If you could please share your thoughts on how you expect the business to shape up?

So I think one of the one of the important things which we need to remember is that monsoon is very, very critical to the country and for the agriculture economy also. And it so happened towards the end of the season, that is kharif season. There were not too many sprays, which were there year before last because of rains, et cetera. And the pest infestation was also not very big. So our volumes in some of the in-licensing products were subdued and a lot of material also was taken back for hygiene reasons. So that was the reason why it was subdued. Having said that, I must also tell you that Q4 is a very normal Q4. The expectation is of a good year. And you will see a significant improvement in Q4 over Q3 in both top line and bottom line.

The next question is from the line of Ashvin Shetty from Marcellus Investment Managers.

Sir, can you just dwell deeper into -- you said that there's a lot of materials taken back due to hygiene reasons in the Crop Protection segment. Can you dwell a little bit deeper into that? What exactly happened?

Yes. So the issue is that sometimes the farmer does not use the sprays because our sprays are also a function of the crop condition. So when there is no pest, why do you need pesticide? I think that was one of the reasons, particularly in chilies that last year -- year before last, star product, which is an in-licensing product, the sales absolutely dropped significantly just because there was no requirement of that spray. So from, say, agri point of view, farmer point of view, it was good news because the prices of chili are low and this chemical is very expensive. So it brought down the cost of production. But that does not mean that it does not have opportunity in other crops. So this chemical is -- can be used across vegetable crops. So it is just a matter of time that we will be able to liquidate this molecule in Q4 and Q1 of the next year. And just to make sure that the hygiene is there, we didn't want our stocks to be lying in the market unattended and in poor storage conditions. So we picked up all the material which was there in the market. Just to remind you, this herbicide, as you know, is very expensive, cost about INR 1 crore per kl. So I think it has to be handled differently. So this is the story. The story for Q4 is the season is likely to be good. People have started asking for material for kharif, and we have also started dispatching because, as you know, the retail pipeline takes about 2, 3 months to fill. So I think the action has already started, and you'll see more of it in the month of February and March.

Understood. And sir, secondly, we saw a very superb performance in the palm oil division. So how sustainable is that? We saw one of the best EBIT margins in this segment. So your view on the outlook going forward?

We have to thank Government of India for that. Whatever we did, we were doing it earlier also, but that 20% duty was not there. So palm oil prices have started rising internationally also because of the B20 mandate by the Indonesian government, which was supposed to be implemented from 1st of April -- 1st of January, and that postponed to 15th of Feb. Indonesia, taking off 40% of their palm oil for biodiesel, it is a very big thing because Indonesia is the largest producer of palm oil. Apart from that, in plantation crops, sometimes trees also produce less. So it was one such year. So all these were bullish reasons, plus this duty also helped. So that is why we had such a fantastic quarter 3. I must also add for the investors that any increase in price, only 20% comes to us, about 80% of the price benefit goes to the farmers in this business.

The next question is from the line of Aejas Lakhani from Unifi.

My first question is pertaining to Dairy.

Can you please louder?

Is this better?

Yes. Perfect.

Sir, my first query is regards to Dairy. Could you call out why did we have a slightly seasonally -- sequentially [ depot ] quarter? And how do you expect the margin trajectory to play out for fourth quarter and the next year? And also, if you could call out what is the direct procurement there and VAP sales?

Okay. So you will ask for data, so give me some time to respond. So I would say that first 9 months, we have grown the revenue by about 1.7%, which is flat, but there is a significant improvement in EBITDA. EBITDA has grown by about 70%. But as far as quarter 3 is concerned, the revenues grew by 1% and the EBITDA dropped by 5.4% as compared to quarter 3 of FY '24. I think one of the chief reasons for drop in EBITDA in Q3 was sudden increase in the milk procurement prices. And the main problem in this industry is that milk procurement prices increase, but the milk companies take their own sweet time sometimes 4 to 6 weeks to increase the consumer prices. Until that time, we all suffer because of increased raw material prices. So I think that has happened. However, one price increase has already come on 21st of January, and the industry is gearing up for more price increases in case the raw material, which is milk cost increases. So just to protect the margins. So that was the first thing. Second thing I must also tell you that CDPL is still work in progress for us. I think our first phase, which started about 1.5 years, 2 years was that we wanted to correct the cost structure, which we have done. And the outcome you can see if you plot our gross margins, we are in the ballpark along with our competitors. All of us are in 27% to 30% bracket, and we have already reached that. And we are -- so the next thing is to get the volumes because now incremental increase in profit is much higher because the contributions are very good. So it is time to push volumes in all segments, and that is what the plan is. You will see a year -- monthly growth happening in most of our products in this business. And now the season is coming. That is why since you asked me about Q4, Q4 is traditionally very good for us because when the temperature increases, the consumption of curd, butter milk, lassi and other value-added products like flavored milk, et cetera, which are high-margin products, that sale goes up. So I believe that Q4 will be much, much better than Q3 as far as performance is concerned. You asked about direct farmer procurement, which is, I think, 58% of total milk is now direct farmer procurement. And every year, we are increasing it considerably. The exit will be close to about 65%. And I'm very sure that next year, it will be close to about 75% to 80% direct farmer procurement. I think I must tell you with scale and direct farmer procurement, we will still be able to shave off almost 0.5% of cost in the coming quarters. Any more question which I missed?

Sir, the VAP contribution?

VAP is 44% or 45% of total sales -- In this quarter. Sorry, in this quarter it is 34% but overall, it is for first 9 months it is above 40%.

That's encouraging. Sir, I just want to understand that the milk procurement price increase has marginally -- single-digit increase has just happened in the third quarter. But if you look at your numbers for even 9 months, there has been limited growth. So I wanted to understand that. And also, sir, compared to the other players who are in VAP indexed more towards curd and with you guys being more indexed towards the flavored milk and the bouquet of more products, not just curd, but curd plus-plus as compared to somebody else, your ability to be able to price -- pass on the prices is not indexed to curd, right, or specific -- you have a larger bouquet. So is it a fair assessment to understand that your ability to pass on this price is much better or can be better?

So I must tell you -- I understood what you're trying to say. So definitely, our ability to pass on prices is improving, and that is also very clear if you take the Nielsen shares in 2 of our cities where we have significant share, which is Hyderabad and Chennai, we are seeing a steady improvement in our market share in these products. So that is one. Second thing I must also tell you is that price increase or premium is also related to the marketing initiatives we undertake. And I must say for last almost a year, we have not done much, but because we were trying to correct our cost structure, which has happened. So in time to come, you will see the price premium start coming as we start advertising and which is -- this is the start of the season and very soon, we will be hitting our plan. And you will see significant improvement in the summer months in our numbers backed by a very strong advertising.

Okay, sir. Sir, my second query...

And the plan is also to follow it up with premium pricing.

Got it. Okay. Sir, the second one I wanted to understand is that on Poultry, what is the specific cut now that of Live Birds, RGC and Yummiez give or take as a percentage of our sales, say, for 9 months because since the buyout that we've made, our entire endeavor was to be more agile and reduce the capacity that was associated with Live bird. So could you just comment about what progress we've made since the buyout then? And what is the percentage split across Live, RGC and Yummiez?

I'll just give you where the business model is moving, and you'll get an idea what our focus is. 9 months FY '24, Live Bird was 41%. It is now 26%. Yummiez, 9 months last year, 15.9% this year, 20% and RGC, 9 months last year, 43% this year, 54%. We plan to hold the Live Bird -- whatever surpluses we need for processing because we need some play there. And from now on, it will be only Real Good Chicken and Yummiez, which will drive the growth and profitability of this division. And Live Bird will be close to about 20%, which is the minimum required to be in processing business.

Okay. Okay. So you will have a component of Live Bird being about 20% incrementally as we speak. And frozen also adapts as quickly to Live Bird prices as the live bird category. Is that an...

I think both -- I would say Yummiez, which is the value-added chicken has no linkage to Live chicken prices. So that is one good news. Second thing is in RGC also, 60%, 70% of our business is contracted on 3 -- on a quarterly basis with big QSRs. So there also, with the volatility, we are not going to be affected. And my sense is that both our plants in Hoskote, Bangalore and Taloja, Mumbai, we are operating at 90% capacity utilization. So this is a year for upselling and improving -- expanding the margins of Real Good Chicken. Some of it you will see Q-on-Q this year. And we are very hopeful that we will be able to improve the margin by a couple of points in FY '26 also.

Got it. And sir, 20% at any point will always be Live Bird sales. So that's the most optimal model to reach, right?

Yes. No, I'm saying 20% because -- look, I'll tell you this -- one of the key requirements of our Live Bird processing, which we learned from our multinational partner, was the health of the bird. So the issue is that birds are tested at the farms, whether they are fit to be slaughtered or not. So I think that is very important, and there has to be uniformity also because they are not hands slaughter. The are machine slaughtter. We cannot pick up a flock which has some 1,500 gram birds, some 2.5 kilo birds because that will disturb the whole planning at the plant. So I'm saying there are a lot of variables which are there, considering that we are still sophisticating this part of the supply chain, we have taken a conservative view that let us keep 20% more. But as we improve this, as we are able to predict better, we will keep on bringing down this buffer.

Got it, sir. Got it. That's very clear and very perfect view, sir. Perfect. And sir, just I wanted to understand the Astec callout. So CDMO, sir, your 9-month number is [ 135 ]. And if I heard your team members saying earlier that the guidance to do a 30%, 40% call out, which you had said was earlier 40%, not 30%, sir. So that growth rate, if I were to just negate what has been done in first 9 months, it's a very tall [indiscernible]. So you're saying that you still feel comfortable to meet that number. Is that understanding correct?

I must also tell you that this year was a big disaster for us as far as Astec is concerned. Not that we lost any customers, but customers either picked very less or kept on postponing their procurement from us. So whatever number we think, and this is the way we will do the budgeting for Astec this time is that whatever confirmed orders we will have, written confirmation from our partners who are buying, that is the only thing which we will talk about. Today, we see a visibility of anything between 30% to 35% growth over FY '25 and '26 with 1 or 2 important customers yet to revert. That is why my colleague said that a 40% guidance can be given. I'm extremely confident that if you ask this question to us in March, we will be able to confirm that also. But we will not be as optimistic as we were last year because now we have a fair idea of how this industry works in bad times when people cancel and postpone the orders at very short notice. So I think -- and whatever numbers we will say, we will tell the Street will be the numbers which we already have in the bag, that is confirmed orders or backed by POs.

Got it. So that's a nice realization and maturity that the team brings. But sir, what I wanted to understand is the guidance of 25% over '24, you're still confident to meet the 30% number.

I don't think so. I must also acknowledge that there are -- as we speak, also some orders are still getting postponed or the confirmation has not come. So we'll get to about 25% growth?

For FY '25.

For FY '25 over FY '24. No, no, no. We won't grow that much, yes.

So it will be a flattish year. Is that a fair understanding for CDMO?

I think so.

Okay, sir. Got it. Perfect. And sir, just very sorry, but lastly, I just want to squeeze in, Balram sir that sir, if you look at our Animal Feeds margin, and I've been hearing the call so often, so I'm aware of the kind of changes you all have done on the R&D side in feeds to make it more richer, the product is more better from an output perspective. But sir, if you exclude the '22, '21 years where we benefited at a margin level again because of the commodity lower prices, the steady-state number at an EBIT per kg was in that 1.4 to 1.5. Now you're saying that all the product level innovation changes, R&D, pricing that has been able to do has structurally altered that 1.4, 1.5 and you feel that, that goes to 1.8 now. Is that understanding correct?

I think that -- what I would say is that a lot of effort has already been made, and I'm very sure what number you are talking will be exceeded. But having said that, I must also tell you that we are extremely dependent on commodity and commodity is also dependent on regulatory. So I'll give you 2 examples to make you understand better. Now at one time, our big competitor for corn was the starch industry. And they were also equally cost conscious as we were. Today, our big competitor for corn is ethanol. So suddenly, the entire game for corn has changed. The base price of INR 18,000 2 years ago, today, the base price is INR 24,000, INR 25,000. And last year, it went up to INR 30,000. This is one example. The second example is, which is DORB. One of the biggest consumer of our DORB was Bangladesh. Now since we've banned the exports to Bangladesh, the price which used to rain at INR 1,890 -- INR 18,000, INR 19,000 a tonne is now at INR 11,000, INR 12,000 a tonne. So a lot of these things make a lot of difference to how the profitability of this business works. And I would say that I'm not expecting any big regulatory changes in time to come, but you should always keep in mind that neither we produce soya meal nor we produce corn ourselves. So we buy from the market, and that will definitely be reflected. Unfortunately, what happens in this industry is that sometimes the time lags are very long. The prices go up immediately. [Technical Difficulty]

I think you went on hold by mistake.

I didn't do anything. Am I audible?

Yes. Balram, sir, we heard you last till the point where you were speaking about that the prices have become very dynamic and you were talking about starch.

So I'm saying that -- and the third thing you must always remember in this industry is that we don't have national competition. We have regional competition, dozens of players in every state. So our pricing is also -- even though we have been trying to get premium, but we are never able to charge more than 1%, 1.5% premium over the local players just because there is so much transparency because they know the price -- everybody knows the prices of raw material also. So I'm saying this business will always be at the levels which you spoke about. We have been steadily increasing the EBIT per tonne. And hopefully, that we are able to continue this -- that is what my expectation is.

Got it. And sir, FFB arrival number, if you could just call out?

FFB arrival number. -- so Q3, we got 1,46,000 tonnes. 9 months, we got 4,79,000 tonnes.

[Operator Instructions] The next question is from the line of Sumant Kumar from Motilal Oswal.

Talk about the plantation of palm oil, how it is increasing for us because last many years, we have seen a not significant increase in FFB for us.

Sumant, can you please be a little bit louder.

So no, I'm talking about -- can you talk about the palm oil plantation for us, how it is growing? And what my observation is the way we are doing plantation, what data we got, the FFB arrival is still not growing whatever plantation we are doing.

So let me just tell you I think the -- we are following the pattern which palm is following all over the world. And I said that in one of the answers earlier that even Indonesia, Malaysia are seeing decline in volumes per tree. So I think that may be a natural phenomenon. My sense is that it will improve again. But having said that, I must tell you that this business, our areas are also adjoining Telangana. Sometimes there is a price difference and some leakages of fruit happens. However, we are trying very hard to keep the fruit -- keep our farmers to ourselves, but you know how Indian agriculture works, sometimes there are leakages. And I won't deny that. The third thing is that how much we have done now that we got allocation in Northeastern states, Orissa. Now this year, there is a significant -- and Telangana, there is a significant increase in the area expansion this year. We might end up anything between 13,000 to 14,000 hectare expansion this year. As compared to last year, it is almost 2.5x. Last year, we were around 5,000 hectares -- Amit, 5,000? 6,000. So we are at about 14 -- we'll end up between 13,000 and 14,000 this year. And we have a lot of seedlings now. Last year, we were a little short, but we are not anymore. And I think we can repeat this again and again for next 4, 5 years.

So talking about the Crop Protection, I have seen a leading player in agrochemical market who is doing good, but we have a fluctuation in our numbers, a significant fluctuation. Sometimes we saw say, higher double-digit, sometimes we show a higher double-digit degrowth. But -- and even this quarter, I have seen a couple of companies are showing good numbers. And even in 9 months also, they are showing good numbers. So is there any issue with our portfolio inclined towards [indiscernible] or other...

Yes. So look, I'll tell you that the companies will have to be compared on product portfolios. Our portfolio is such that it was very focused on chili, which did not happen. So I'm saying that we got into a little bit of trouble. But if you see with so much of focus on cotton, we are the leading players in cotton herbicide. So probably you'll see very good numbers for us when you don't see good numbers for some other company which is having products in for another crop. So I think this will continue. And I think this is -- you give me a feeling of deja vu because about 1 or 2 quarters ago, I was asked whether we can continue with these high margins. And my answer was the same that it is agriculture. We cannot cover all the crops. Nobody has the capability to develop molecules for all the crops. So we just have to be a little bit lucky that the crop we are operating in is also performing. I'm saying that this will always happen. But my suggestion is that don't look at us Q-on-Q. We will still give a stunning performance as far as the whole year is concerned, and that I can assure you.

The next question is from the line of Abhijit from Kotak Securities.

Just to dwell a little bit further on Astec. So the -- at the beginning of the call, if I heard you correctly, I think Arijit mentioned 30% to 40% growth for fiscal '25 from the CDMO business. But later on, I think it was mentioned that we might only be flattish. So if you could please just clarify exactly what the expectation is or how much orders we actually have from -- in-hand for this year?

So let me just clarify because I think since there's some sound issue. So actually, the CAGR from FY '22 to '25 in CDMO on a small base was 42%. Okay?

'22 to '25?

But this year, CDMO, there will be no growth. It will be flat. And next year, we are expecting -- if you ask me today, any 30% plus or minus 2%, 3% will definitely happen. But if you ask me 2 months later, I can tell you a more accurate number there because now we are talking not about expectations, but the orders we will get, we will talk about that only.

Okay. So just to confirm, for fiscal '25, we expect it to remain around INR 270 crores, which is what it was last year?

Yes.

Okay. And on the enterprise business, any improvement in prices, et cetera, that we are seeing in any of our key molecules or in demand environment?

So from third quarter onwards, there is an increase in prices, though not very significant, but at least if you say the prices have increased to a level of positive contribution for most of the enterprise businesses. But the best part is slowly the volumes are coming back. So what we see that fourth quarter onwards that we should see a very significant -- or a significant recovery in terms of volume. That is what we are first primarily looking into. Price will be very difficult to say right now because there will be too much of competition, what is the seasonality. But for us, it is important that the volumes are coming back. And I think most of the inventory, the problem of inventory is over from Europe and U.S. And if the domestic season of China and India picks up, I think the pricing will also see an improvement.

Okay. So for the enterprise business, any sort of outlook you'd like to provide in terms of volume growth?

I think we are a bit cautious on the enterprise business. So we are expecting anything between 14% to 16% growth next year. We'll be very happy with that, but we want an accretive growth as far as margins are concerned. Last year, because we were -- or say, FY '25, we were stuck with high-cost inventory. So significant part of the year, we had to sell at negative contribution. I think we don't want to repeat that. So we'll be extremely cautious in our inventory management, watch the prices and do the business on positive contribution only.

The next question is from the line of Jignesh Kamani from Nippon Mutual Fund.

Just on the Animal Feed segment, volume...

Can you speak a little louder, sir.

Yes. So if you think about the volume, you can say on the Animal Feed, it still grew by just 1.8%, though it is much better compared to what we have done in first half. So how is the current trend in the volume across the 3 segments? Do you think that cattle feed, you can earlier where the farmer was not investing in the cattle because of lower milk price and everything. And there was also challenging in the you can say there. How is the current scenario? I see that the volume growth Y-o-Y basis still looks healthy for the fourth quarter and FY '25?

So fourth quarter will be even better than the third quarter both in terms of profitability and in terms of volume growth. My sense is that milk prices are likely to remain high in the coming quarters. And layer was one area where the placements were less. And that is why because if there is no bird, where will we sell the feed. That was one of the issues. But layer feed, fish feed, both these feeds are likely to see a big jump in volumes next year because there is a lot of placement which has happened in last quarter and this quarter, the placement is still happening. So I am confident that we will improve in Q4 and further improve in FY '26.

Understood. Second, on the Dairy business, how is the trend in our milk procurement price for both us and the industry? Because price [indiscernible] price was under pressure.

Yes. So in the first week of December, the rate went up by about -- if we take about INR 1.20, INR 1.30 per kg. And unfortunately, the price increase in part of South India only came on 21st of January. So we had to suffer that cost increase for almost a month. Today, it is holding steady at pre-, say, January 21 prices, the milk cost for us. And we are also watching along with other industry players. In case the cost goes up further, we will be taking the price up further. But as far as I am concerned, I don't think that we are going to see a very big spike in cost in next 2, 3 weeks because normally, it is in March when prices keep on going up.

Understood. So what was the price increase happened in the milk procurement has been passed on to the industry with [indiscernible] right?

At the consumer level, it has happened. At the farmer level, price increased about 1.5 months ago. But our prices went up only on January 21.

The next question is from the line of [ Aman Vora ] from Premium Capital.

My first question is on Astec. Just like 3 months -- 2, 3 months back in the second quarter call, we had given a guidance of about INR 400 crores of CDMO revenue for FY '25. While just in the matter of last 2, 3 months, what has happened that we are cutting our F '24 -- '25 revenue guidance by 30%?

Maybe there is 2 -- in fact, 3 particular CDMOs, which goes to almost U.S., Europe and Japan. And because of their larger inventory, it is a combination of both fungicide and herbicide. Because of the larger market inventory, they are cutting down on their projections. So that is the main reason for this fourth quarter because initially, it got delayed because the production really start from second quarter, but it delayed to third quarter, then again, there is a delay. It is mostly because the old inventories are there in the market.

Right. And on the enterprise side, like you mentioned that we are seeing positive contribution margins. So is it across the portfolio? Or there are still some molecules where we are seeing negative contribution margins?

So for our major 2 molecules, it is positive. The remaining one, we will see because the season has not come. But the other 2 major molecules, which go for domestic and export, we are seeing almost positive growth in both domestic as well as export market.

Both have reached about 10%.

Got it. And just on the balance sheet side, post last almost 10 quarters of losses, we're sitting on huge debt and our net worth has taken quite cut at Astec. So what is the larger view of the Godrej Agrovet Group and management on funding the Astec business?

So we have been watching the situation very closely. The early signs for next year is that there won't be any cash losses. So -- and we will -- we discuss this almost every month, and we'll see how to fund this company if required. But we are still holding back any decision on that just to see the performance of the business for another quarter or so.

Right. Got it. And just for the Agrovet business, sir, I've discussed with you multiple times in the last couple of years. If I see Agrovet as a consolidated entity, individually, all businesses have a lot of growth opportunities within them for, say, a decade. But the issue is that every quarter, one or the other business acts as a negative hedge. One would do exceptionally well, while there will be something else which doesn't do well, which as a consolidated entity, we do not see encouraging top line growth over, say, a 2-year, 3-year CAGR period. So my question to you is, when you position this entity, maybe in structure or maybe a different structure where we -- it can be more value accretive for us investors because as minority investors, we've seen limited creation of wealth in Agrovet since its listing about 7, 8 years back.

Spot on. I think we also understand that because Agrovet is not getting quoted at the current full potential also just because of this reason and difficulty to understand and one business is not doing well in 1 year and the other not doing well in the other year. I think we are cognizant of that fact. We are thinking about how to simplify the structure so that you all get more visibility. So I think this is also something which we are working on. Probably in time to come, you'll hear more about this.

Right. This is one request that I've made time and again and would request the management to kindly consider. And just one last one from me is the exchange filing on the INR 1,000 crore raise that we were doing at Agrovet in the form of debt. Any update on that or anything that you want to enlighten us with?

We are looking at if we can -- internal accruals, et cetera, because we want to drive down our working capital significantly in this quarter. I think we have plans to do that. So we just postponed that because we may not INR 1,000 crores, we may need INR 600 crores, INR 500 crores. Anyway, it was just an enabling resolution.

The next question is from the line of Rikin Shah from Boring AMC.

My question is pertaining to the CDMO part in Astec. What's the kind of pipeline that has -- exists right now?

And what kind of CDMO.

Yes. And what kind of molecules do we expect to add in the next few quarters?

The pipeline, we have around 12 projects we are doing in R&D in different stages of R&D. It is mostly into innovators who we're are working with. And I would say that commercialization date is very difficult to say because there is a requirement in terms of R&D followed by, say, other compliance issues of registration, data generation. But I think next 3 to 4 quarters, we will see one by one, some projects are coming online because commercialization is not a problem because we have sufficient assets with us. We are where the commercialization will happen. Now it is a matter of R&D, then slowly the registration is coming online. But all the projects have a definite time line in terms of commercialization.

Sir, the reason I ask this is because, I mean, having been to your R&D setup, I can definitely say it is one of the state-of-the-art facilities. And in no means -- it's definitely something your customers have appreciated as well. So I'm just trying to gauge why in the down cycle as well, we're trying to -- perhaps we are struggling to pull more business than our competitors are also pulling business, maybe not at the same pace, but they definitely are.

Yes. So as far as we are concerned, I can talk about ourselves. I must say that considering the global situation, I think the response from a lot of these innovators was also subdued. And you must have heard that some of the big companies had also banned travel, this, that, et cetera. So I'm seeing a lot of other things also resulted in these delays. But having said that, I must say that now we have upped the efforts to probably connect with more customers, particularly in Europe. We are working with some consultants who have been in this business for a long time for opening doors for us and get us new business. I am yet to see any results because it has been fairly recent. But I'm very sure if the markets improve, we will definitely be with our kind of assets, manpower assets as well as physical assets. We will be in consideration, I'm sure, for CDMO project for these big companies.

Right. Sir, but in terms of the talent pool perhaps that has exited and maybe we have not replenished that, don't you think that could be an impediment to opening those doors?

Talent pool has been replenished. So there is no problem. I think there are a lot of things in pipeline also. So I think we are preparing for a higher workload for projects next year. And I'm very sure that, that will not be a limitation for us.

All right. And sir, in terms of the enterprise business, now that it will be obvious that our 2 important contributors are largely the pricing is in a range. So in terms of being able to reject them via earlier plant modification, so what -- has there anything progressed on that?

For Enterprise, have we made any plant modifications, et cetera? No, they are not needed.

The last question is from the line of Aejas Lakhani from Unifi.

Just 2 more follow-ups. One is, sir, do you have any visibility of when the GCPL pet food products business is likely to commence? And what progress have we made on -- if we have made anything in that front?

I can tell you about the second question. So I think the pilot plant, et cetera, whatever our responsibility was of the pilot plant, I think it will be ready in a few weeks' time where most of the experiments can be done and a lot of production for marketing trials can be taken. The full-fledged 35,000 to 40,000 tonnes per annum plant will only come towards the end of FY '26.

Okay. Okay. So basically, sir, we had been asked by them to make a pilot plant and so that they can curtail -- they can start their R&D experiments, and we have done our bit and hand it over to them? So then the next 1 year will go into a testing phase?

No, no. I don't know about that. I think whatever their schedule, I cannot talk about, I think GCPL is the best -- is in the best position to talk about it. But point is that my short answer is that we are ready with the initial infrastructure, and we will be ready with the final infrastructure in a year's time.

Okay. Okay. You'll be ready with the final infrastructure 1 year from now. Okay. Okay. And sir, just wanted to understand that what is our CapEx expectation for entire FY '26? And what is the CapEx outlay that we have done for 9 months? And what is the pending amount in the last quarter?

INR 161 crores of CapEx has been done by GAVL consolidated in the first 9 months. We'll end up at about INR 220 crores or so. And we have similar CapEx planned for next year.

Okay. Okay. And just one last bit, sir. I'll come back to you, sir. Let me just articulate my question.

That was the last question for today. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Nadir Godrej for closing comments. Over to you, sir.

Thank you. I hope we have been able to answer all your questions. If you have any further questions or would like to know more about the company, we would be happy to be of assistance. Stay safe and stay healthy. Thank you once again for taking the time to join us on this call.

Thank you. On behalf of PhillipCapital, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines. Thank you.