Ion Exchange (India) Limited (IONEXCHANG.NS) Q1 FY2026 Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Ladies and gentlemen, good day, and welcome to the Ion Exchange (India) Limited Q1 FY '26 Earnings Conference Call hosted by Valorem Advisors. [Operator Instructions] Please note that this call is being recorded. With this, I now hand the conference over to Ms. Nupur Jainkunia from Valorem Advisors. Thank you, and over to you, ma'am.

Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone, and a very warm welcome to you all. My name is Nupur Jainkunia from Valorem Advisors. We represent the Investor Relations of Ion Exchange (India) Limited. On behalf of the company and Valorem Advisors, I would like to thank you all for participating in the company's earnings conference call for the first quarter of the financial year 2026. Before we begin, let me mention a short cautionary statement. Some of the statements made in today's earnings call may be forward-looking in nature. Such forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, which could cause actual results to differ from those anticipated. Such statements are based on management's beliefs as well as assumptions made by information currently available to management. Audiences are cautioned not to place any undue reliance on these forward-looking statements in making any investment decision. The purpose of today's earnings call is purely to educate and bring awareness about the company's fundamental business and financial quarter under review. Let me now introduce you to the management participating with us in today's earnings call and hand it over to them for their opening remarks. We have with us Mr. Aankur Patni, Vice Chairman; Mr. Indraneel Dutt, Managing Director and CEO; Mr. Vasant Naik, Group Chief Financial Officer; and Ms. Nikisha Solanki, Company Secretary. Without any further delay, I request Mr. Vasant Naik to start with his opening remarks. Thank you, and over to you, sir.

Thank you, Nupur. Good afternoon, everybody. It is a pleasure to welcome you all to the earnings conference call for the first quarter of the financial year 2026. For the first quarter under review on a consolidated basis, the company reported an operating income of INR 5,832 million, an increase of around 3% year-on-year. The EBITDA stood at INR 627 million, a decline of 2% year-on-year. EBITDA margin stood at 10.75%, and the net profit was INR 484 million, an increase of 8% year-on-year, while the PAT margin was around 8.3%. During the quarter, the company migrated to the SAP environment, which led to certain transition-related challenges that partially impacted the business volumes. However, the operations have now largely stabilized. Now let me take you through the quarterly segmental performance on a consolidated basis. In the Engineering division, the revenue for the quarter was INR 3,180 million, a reduction of 2% year-on-year. The EBIT for this segment was INR 278 million, an increase of 48% year-on-year. The inquiry pipeline remains steady for the Engineering division during the quarter. However, delays in the finalization of certain large value opportunities impacted both order inflow and backlog. The execution of the UP Jal Nigam order remained muted. On a positive note, we received payments from the Sri Lankan authorities against approved bills, which will facilitate the expeditious closure of the contract. At the end of Q1 FY '26, the total order book stood at INR 26,640 million, while the bid book pipeline was more than INR 92,000 million. Moving to the Chemical division. The revenue for the quarter was INR 1,889 million, a reduction by almost 5% year-on-year. The EBIT was INR 467 million, a decrease of 6% year-on-year basis. The segment has maintained the margin profile. The company is on track to commission the greenfield manufacturing plant at Roha for manufacturing of resins in the current quarter that is Q2. For the Consumer Products division, the revenue for the quarter stood at INR 902 million, an increase of almost 36% year-on-year. The loss for the quarter was INR 9 million compared to a loss of INR 34 million in the same period of the previous year. The segment continues to witness consistent turnover growth supported by deeper market penetration and increased acceptance of our product portfolio. With that, we can now open the floor to the question-and-answer session. Thank you.

[Operator Instructions] The first question comes from the line of Sabil from Unifi Capital.

We have taken about INR 2 crores provision of doubtful debts in FY '24. We got payments from Sri Lankan projects, that is good news for us. We wanted to understand what's our policy to recognize any loss or any accounts receivable issue that we may face on the UP project or on the onerous project, which are we executing? Basically, I want to understand what's the policy to recognize loss or impairment for projects we face issues in.

The provisioning is actually based on party-to-party level assessment of the outstanding and situation on the ground. So depending on how the project is progressing, how the payments are coming, the company has a provisioning policy for each of the contracts which are under execution. In addition to that, we also have an expected credit loss policy, which -- details of which are given in the annual report, which is basically, we are recognizing certain losses based on the overall aging of the accounts receivable in the book. So a combination of both these parameters, we are assessing the credit process and accordingly, provisions are taken in the books.

So we are confident that we don't feel any sort of stress that happened in FY '25 and FY '26 on this issue, right?

Yes. I mean at the March end, at -- during the annual closing of accounts, the detailed scrutiny is done by the state auditors also apart from the periodic revisions in the provisions, what we do throughout the year. So we are confident as of date, the provisioning is adequate to cover any possible credit losses, which we may have.

Okay. Next question was on the Roha expansion. Sir, this was largely to cater to export markets. Can you please call out what -- which geographies are we targeting? And which -- and if we will be facing any tariff impact?

Yes. Thanks for the question. So we currently also do business across most of the geographies in the world. We have been present in the Americas market. We are present in Europe, Asia Pacific, and we also are increasing our presence in the Middle East market. So all of these geographies are catered to -- by the division of the company. And this will -- at the market that we will continue to expand and grow with the Roha coming on stream.

Are we envisaging any particular increase in the U.S. geography?

Yes. That's again one of the bigger markets. And we -- like in Europe, Middle East and APAC, we'll also continue to expand our presence and coverage in the U.S. market.

And we would be, let's say, from effective today, the 25% tariff will be effective if we make any sales over there?

So we are studying the tariff regulations in the last revision that was circulated which was in effect until now. There was no impact on the products that we were selling. So we are taking a look at the new tariffs that have been announced. And based on the situation, then we will appropriately respond. So far, till the last policy, there was no impact on our products selling into the U.S. market.

Okay. So next one on the Engineering segment...

Sir, sorry to interrupt. May I request you to join the queue for follow-up questions, please. The next question comes from the line of Chetan Vora from Abakkus Asset Manager.

Sir, I wanted to understand what was the impact on the sales because of this transitioning towards SAP?

So Chetanji, we had some impact because of transition to the new SAP platform. The biggest impact was in the month of April. For our chemicals business because it is largely consumable driven, we've had some impact or some revenue loss, which we could not recover. For our Engineering business, it is more of a timing issue. So some of those have got extended out to the following quarter, which is the current quarter, which you hope to recover in the next 2, 3 months of this quarter and the first month of the next quarter.

Would it be possible for you to quantify on the same?

So we don't give specific numbers but I would say that this is contained within a single-digit impact -- percentage impact.

Single-digit percentage impact?

Yes.

Okay. And so adjusting for that, how do we see the full year for the Engineering division in terms of the growth?

As we mentioned in the last call, our policy is to give an outlook for the year at the end of the second quarter. So the second quarter will come back and give you an update. As of now, there is no major difference in the outlook compared to what we saw when we had the last quarter call of the last financial year.

And the legacy projects will be getting over by quarter 2, yes? That's what we had mentioned last quarter.

No. Last quarter, we did not mention that. We have said that we are going through the execution of the projects where we've had execution challenges. We continue to make progress through them. But it will take us till the end of the year for us to close the project as of what we see right now.

Okay. On the chemical also, whether the sales were affected because of this SAP thing because the revenue growth was flattish?

Yes, yes. We actually lost almost entire April month because of the SAP implementation. And actually, that segment has been more impacted because that's consumption based, as you understand. So we could not get back the significant part of the April revenues, which we lost.

So the revenue loss is lost for the Chemicals as such?

For that particular few weeks. But I think we are now on the recovery part, I think the Chemical business, the platform has stabilized. And we expect us to be back on usual terms of business for the second quarter.

And by when this new plant will be getting commissioned?

Sorry, could you repeat? Okay. So the Roha plant will get commissioned in this quarter. We are making good progress.

But July has already gone. So maybe August is not expected, by September end?

Our endeavor is to get it up and running as soon as possible. We are actually even more eager to get this plant up. We've made good progress. We are in the process of commissioning but there's also stabilization and getting the right quality products out. So we are hopeful that we should be able to give you good news by the time we come back for the next quarter update.

Right. And lastly, sir, what is the other income of this INR 19 crores?

Other income, it comprises of the interest income on a temporary cash surpluses, which we are parking in FDs. And also there is an element of exchange gain on account of our receivables.

The next question comes from the line of Deepak from Sundaram Mutual Fund.

Yes. Sir, first question is regarding this tariff things, which is panning out. Now India is 25% and European region at 15%. And as you know that some of the plants of Ecolab and LANXESS, which are our competitors in this chemical space, they have factories in Europe as well, which places them at a relatively better position versus us. So do we see that there could be some volume lifting problem for us, let's say, in the U.S. market as Europe is now relatively better position in terms of, let's say, export because of lower tariffs? How are you looking at the situation?

Thank you for the question. From our perspective, it's a vast market and we continue to expand our presence and that coverage. There are various players supplying to the U.S. market from all across the world, including the U.S. itself. So as I said in the early -- response to earlier question that we are still studying the impact of the tariff increase. As I said in the last -- the previous tariffs that was there, there was no impact on our product line. We're still studying the same. And -- but we feel that we should be able to continue to hold on and continue our business with our set of customers that we cater to. And we also are confident that we'll gain share in some specific areas. So overall, we don't see this yet to be a cause of concern that you would like to highlight.

Okay. And sir, what kind of capacity utilization are we targeting for the new Roha plant in FY '26?

So this plant is a very large plant and is supposed to increase in phases. As of now, our plan is to go up to full capacity over a period of the next 3 years. So we plan to -- so whatever our plans are for the next balance 8 months, 7 to 8 months of this financial year, we feel confident that we'll be able to utilize that capacity.

Okay. And second is on the Engineering front. So you have mentioned in your PPT that there have been some delays in large order value, right? So I just wanted to understand what is the quantum of the order backlog deferral are we talking about?

So as you see from the data that we have submitted, we have not had any significant order wins to report to the -- substantive order wins to report the market. We continue to pursue selectively opportunities in the market, both in India and abroad. As we had mentioned in our last few updates, we continue to remain extremely selective. In the last quarter, there were 1 or 2 projects we had targeted, which we had lost. We don't have any losses to report for this last concluded quarter. However, timing-wise, the conclusion and the results of those projects we were pursuing have been delayed. So that is the reason we don't have any significant wins to report. However, we continue to pursue all the opportunities that we are selectively pursuing.

But sir, is the situation in terms of, let's say, new order intake, is it as of now, relatively looking better than what we saw in Q1?

Ultimately, it is all linked to what comes and what we end up winning. As I said, we have not had any significant decisions being made. They have been deferred. So we continue to pursue and we continue to remain hopeful that we should be able to share some good news in the days to come.

Okay. And sir, just to continue to that. So this quarter, we have reported an EBIT margin in the Engineering segment of 8.7%, which is almost like 4 to 5 quarter high. So just wanted to understand what led to such significant improvement in our EBIT margin in Engineering segment? And how sustainable is it, let's say, in the next 9 months of FY '26?

Yes, the current quarter, what you just referred to the EBIT margins, it has benefited from a onetime extra cost rebate, which we got from one of the large EPC contract, which is presently under execution. So considering that the current year revenue is lower than the previous year. And if we exclude the above impact, the margin would have been definitely lower as compared to what we would -- what we have disclosed in the previous year because my infrastructure costs are at a much elevated level and they are designed to meet to much higher volumes. Also, the legacy project, which largely depressed the margin last year in the current quarter, there was insignificant invoicing.

Okay. Okay. So sir, adjusting for that onetime benefit and also this legacy contract, what could have been our margin then?

Without going into the specifics of the exact margins, what we can say is that it would have been lower than the last year's full year Engineering segment margin, what we disclosed of around 6.9%.

Okay, sir. And sir, one last question on consumer. So this quarter, we have seen a strong comeback, and we have reported almost a 37% Y-o-Y growth rate in the consumer product. Just want to understand that is this because of some order deferral in the institutional order from Q4 to Q1 within the consumer? Or is it something else?

No, this is not due to any special causes. This is a very large segment where we have been continuously trying to increase our presence and coverage and business. And we have been strengthening across the board, the company in terms of our coverage and customer engagement across all the segments, including the Consumer Products segment. This being a more shorter cycle nature of our business, we are seeing some of those results trickle in. But still, we are just scratching the tip of the opportunity potential here. There is a lot -- lot, lot more that I think needs to get done. So this is not -- to answer your question in one line, not attributed to any special causes, but as a result of our increased market coverage.

Okay. Sir, then to understand this...

Sir, sorry to interrupt. May I request you to join the queue for a follow-up question. The next question comes from the line of Nirman from Unique PMS.

Sir, my question is on the Chemicals segment. So one clarification first. So the degrowth that we saw this quarter was largely due to the SAP implementation and not because we were seeing any margin challenges and we wanted to protect our margins, right?

That is a correct assumption.

Okay. And sir, secondly, so we have a lot of capacity in our existing plant as well, and we'll also be commissioning the Roha plant. So could you just give your plans for the new plant as well as the Chemical division in whole? How do you ramp up? Or how do you go forward?

So I think the capacity comment you made about a lot of existing capacity in our current plants possibly is not a true representation. And that is predominantly the reason that the company decided to go for the Roha plant for our resin chemical subsegment. The other subsegments also, the plants are operating at decently higher levels of capacity. So we feel confident that we will be able to use up the progressive increased capacity available due to the commissioning of the Roha plant.

Sir, what would be the existing plant's utilization then?

Current year, still the volumes are a bit subdued because of the SAP-related challenges, the capacity was in the region of around 65%.

And we feel that this could go up to 80%, 85%?

Yes. This will go up. I mean some of our plants have -- I think there's significant headroom for us to go, whether it is 80%, 85% or whatever percentage that we would not like to comment. But we have headroom to grow, which is what got impacted because of our inability to service due to the SAP transition. Effective July onwards, it's back to business as usual across all our plants in the Chemical segment.

Okay, sir. And sir, one last question on the Engineering side, you mentioned that this quarter, the margin was due to a onetime thing. So we -- so the legacy project and the UP slowdown will continue for this year, right? It will only say, go away from the next year onwards?

That's right. The UP project will continue for some time of the next year also, while we are hoping that the legacy project as of now, we are expecting to substantially close by end of this financial year.

The next question comes from the line of Henil Bagadia from Equicorp.

I had some questions around the Sunrise Industries. Sir, do we have -- have we developed the in-house tech for the semiconductor, solar and the data center vertical? And is this an extension of the Indion Swift 5Gx tech that we have developed for the pharma and the biotech world in terms of controlling the particulate particles in water?

Thank you for the question. So we have continued as a company to actively engage in the market potential for the segments that you mentioned. Across all these segments, the company has been successful in getting business over the past many years. We continue to pursue opportunities in pharma, in solar and in specific semiconductor pursuits that come up. This has almost now become a part of our regular business, especially the solar and the pharma segment pursuits.

Just for further clarification, did we -- so there are a few companies in India, which have gone for the India to part. So have we bid for the projects and have we converted them into orders? Or are we still in the process?

So we have executed a lot of projects in ultrapure water in the solar segment. We continue to pursue opportunities across the solar and the renewable energy spectrum. Again, we are selective in our bids, and we also -- as we mentioned in the last investor call, we would want to be selective and pick up projects where we believe we can have a profitable execution accretive to the Engineering profitability in the segment. So we continue to pursue opportunities across the solar, semiconductor and pharma segments.

So is it fair to assume, I mean, based on market data for every gigawatt, it requires about 1 MLD of ultrapure high water plant? And what would be -- if so, what would be the size of these contracts, I mean for MLD -- if we go for 4 million liters per day?

It's difficult to give such a number. It varies. The semiconductor projects are at a particular level depending on the nature of those plants. There also there is variation. So the solar module manufacturing plants also vary based on capacity. And we have done projects across the size spectrum for large domestic and international solar players also. So difficult to give you a number but our team continues to engage in a very, very focused fashion on these segments. And very selectively, we're pursuing opportunities that we want to close in our favor.

And lastly, on the engineering part. So if we remove the legacy order, that is the UP Jal Nigam and the Sri Lanka part, so do we have any percentage of the order book, which has got low or extremely low margins? Or is it fair to assume the existing order book is in line with the EPC margins, the standard EPC margins that we bid for?

So as we said, my colleague said that one adverse order that we had called out...

So that was going to get over in the Q2 of this year, right, the industry-related order where we had called.

We just responded that and clarified that this order will be executed all through the end of this financial year. Apart from this particular order, the other orders that we continue to execute are in the average ballpark of our Engineering segment business numbers as we currently move forward. So we don't see any other concerns -- major concerns to highlight in any of the other orders that we have in the order backlog.

Sir, just a further clarification. In case there is any adversity on the UP Jal Nigam order, does the contract allow for cost -- I mean, cost escalations -- passing on the cost escalations?

So the UP Jal Nigam contracts, because they have been moving slow, we have already taken some of those out of our backlog, and that is where there was a dip in the order backlog that we carried, which we reported in the last investor call. Beyond this, we don't anticipate any other adverse impact on these orders for which the funds availability has been slower than in the past few years.

The next question comes from the line of Ruchit Agrawal from Unifi Mutual Fund.

A question on the UP project. We had called out last quarter that the O&M portion will be executed over the next 10 years. Could you please help bifurcate how much of the INR 366 crores outstanding would constitute of the O&M portion?

The order backlog, which is presently disclosed as part of the UP project does not include the O&M portion. It is purely the EPC part.

Okay. And could you help quantify that number?

It will not be possible to quantify because the individual -- as you know, it is a conglomeration of smaller individual contracts, and it really depends on how much value of the contract gets finally commissioned and is based as a percentage of that. So maybe going -- I mean, maybe end of the current financial year as the project moves towards the completion phase, we will be in a better position to disclose the O&M aspect.

Sure, sir. And in the previous call, as the proportion of the UP project and the onerous project as a percentage of our backlog is going down, do we expect the margin trajectory to be better this year and directionally inching back towards the 9% to 11% mark going forward? And can we say that Q1 '26 was the starting for that?

No, we cannot say that. We already clarified that Q1 '26 performance was driven by a special cause. My colleague also clarified that if it was not for that particular project, then we would have closed at a rate which would be lower than the closing rate of the last financial year for that particular segment. We have also mentioned that UP continues to be slow in execution because of fund availability. And we've also mentioned that the onerous project that you referred to will continue execution through the end of this financial year. Hence, we don't expect any significant improvement in the overall profitability of this segment for this year.

Sure, sir. On the products segment, the margin that we saw this quarter of minus 1%, do we foresee margins in this segment trending higher compared to last year, potentially making lower losses as compared to last year, as we -- we've envisaged the breakeven of INR 500 crores, and we have achieved a scale of INR 300 crores plus currently.

Yes. So as you see the performance that we called out for the Consumer Products segment, I think there has been an improvement in both the top line as we increase the market coverage. And this has also helped us reduce the losses that we had in that particular segment because we keep on investing in that segment to get market coverage and growth. So overall, I would say that segment has performed better. And we continue to believe that there is further headroom in that segment to do more. So the teams are continuing to engage in this segment to continue to further improve the performance over a gradual period of time. For this particular year, we'll try to hold on to these performance levels. But over the longer term, we expect that the performance of this segment will improve.

Sir, last question. While we wish to take margin-accretive orders from here on, how do we feel about the order inflows standing in the next couple of quarters?

As I said to a few queries back, we continue to pursue opportunities. There have been timing issues. We announced in the last investor call that there were a couple of orders that went against us, discussions went against us. This quarter, we don't have any adverse losses to report. It's just a timing issue where some of these pursuits being higher value ones do take time to close. So we continue to pursue those opportunities and be selective and pick up orders, which will allow us to be accretive to the current profitability in that segment.

The next follow-up question comes from the line of Deepak from Sundaram Mutual Fund.

Sir, just to come back on that Consumer Product division. But I'm still not clear that what led to that 37% Y-o-Y growth. You said it's market reach and you're building infrastructure. Could you just elaborate -- is it that in the B2C segment? Did we introduce new product, which is seeing traction? So where is the traction coming from? Is it which region, what product? Is it that institution segment is also doing well? Could you just break down the growth profile of this 36% in Q1? And how likely is it that this INR 90 crore run rate will continue for the next 9 months as well?

So I think with due respect, Deepakji, a lot of this possibly we'll consider as business confidential in terms of -- we are in a very, very competitive space as you would appreciate and agree. Our teams are out there in the market, helped by launch of newer products. We play across the water spectrum, be it in residential, B2C, in commercial as well as an institution in the rural segment. We have been introducing our water purification technologies across the B2C spectrum. We have launched products, health products like alkaline water, hydrogen water. We continue to expand our presence in neighboring geographies like Nepal. So all of these are actions that the teams are taking on the ground, improving their overall business health while growing in the face of strong competition. So -- and we believe -- we feel good about the path that they are on. We feel that they'll be able to hold on to this performance for this year. And over the longer term, we continue to invest in this segment of the business, and we believe that the longer-term prospects are even better.

Okay. Okay. And one question was on engineering. So you must have seen a lot of Indian companies are doing JVs and other projects in Middle East, right, where a lot of the desalination plants also come into the picture because of this pipeline projects. So just wanted to get a flavor that are we seeing increasing order inquiry in the Middle East region for our EPC business? Means how is the international order inflow order book or inquiries looking like? And how likely is it that we may back some good large orders in those regions, let's say, in the next 9 months?

We continue to pursue opportunities on Engineering orders in international geographies. If you remember, the company had done considerably well in the last financial year on our international businesses. These opportunities are strategic in nature, which we continue to pursue selectively and pick up orders that we get. We are aware of the geographies and the specific opportunities that you are referring to. We continue to pursue in all those segments, specifically Middle East, Africa market. And we are in engagement with the right opportunities that we feel makes sense for our company and to ensure that we remain accretive to the overall profitability of the Engineering segment.

Okay. And sir, any plans to expand the membrane component manufacturing capacity in Engineering? And just to follow up on that, how is the competition intensity in this domestic market when we are kind of bidding for the engineering projects, just to these last point?

So your first question on membrane capacity, we continue to monitor the capacity utilization of all our chemical product business segments. And as and when like we have done for our resin business with the expansion of the Roha capacity, the Roha new plant coming up, the company will take appropriate steps in augmenting capacity as and when it is required, and we will come back and report those to the appropriate forum. With respect to your second question on the competition in Engineering segment, it is brutal. It is intense. There is a significant pressure on pricing and which is where we continue to remain selective in the nature and kind of projects that we pick up from the domestic market.

The next question comes from the line of Mihir Vyas from 9 Rays EquiResearch.

I'm new to the company. Can you please help me understand what is the status on UP Jal Nigam project, I mean, in terms of receivables?

As we have mentioned in the con call, the fund inflow from the UP government for this contract has been very slow, which has resulted in the execution getting affected. And as a result, the account receivable on this project continue to be at elevated levels. But since we don't call out on specifics of individual contracts on the call, I will not be able to add any further other than saying the levels of the receivables are on the higher side.

Sir, any color on how it is -- like by when can we expect it to reduce? Or has it started reducing?

As of now, the flow has not yet improved, but we are getting continuous, I mean, indications that the flow should improve in the coming months. So we remain hopeful that once the flow improves, apart from our receivables getting liquidated, our execution on this project should also get ramped up.

The next follow-up question comes from the line of Sabil from Unifi Capital.

In the Chemicals segment, we had faced RM cost inflation in fourth quarter. Is the cost inflation now behind us? Or are we able to pass on the increased costs complete to our clients?

So as you will see in that segment performance, we have been able to improve from the temporary dip that we had, and we are able to get back to the average profitability levels of this segment in the last financial year. So we feel good about how we have handled the past quarter. However, this is a very dynamic situation, as you will agree. We continue to monitor our input costs, and we also look at the rupee depreciation impact that we may have going forward. So first quarter was good, but this is an area where we continue to need to keep track of all these various input variables and ensure that we're able to deliver at the expected levels or the expected past performance levels of profitability in this segment.

Just to get a better color on the order inflow or the orders in the Engineering segment, sir, would be taking over a lot of industrial projects or it will be more of selective government of, let's say, World Bank funded projects. How do we -- how are we thinking about this?

So we remain consistent with our strategy with respect to the Engineering business. Our projects are largely on the industrial side. Our projects that we pick up on the infrastructure or municipal side, like the Sri Lanka contract is very strategic, but very few in nature. And that's the strategy that we will continue to pursue, and that's the profile of jobs that we continue to pursue in the current offer basket as well for us.

The next question comes from the line of Saket Kapoor from Kapoor & Company.

Thank you for a very detailed discussion. Just a closing point on this UP part of -- UP project, sir. This was -- we got one of the few packages for a large project. So can you give some color whether only our packages are pertaining to some set of execution has been interrupted because of the cash flow issue or the entire setup has to be awaited now because of this cash crunch issue? And what is the feedback from the Uttar Pradesh government on them not being able to clear the dues of companies like us?

So at the onset, it will be inappropriate for us to comment on contracts received by other organizations. We can only talk about the contract that we are executing with this particular customer. As we said that we have receivables from this project, which we are following up and pursuing with the customer in question here to help collect. And because of the slowness of fund availability, we were forced to slow down the execution of this project. As we also said that because of the slowness over the past couple of quarters at least, we have taken a conservative call on this particular project and reduced our estimate in the order backlog to be able to give a more realistic picture of the order backlog that we are pursuing. We continue to engage with the customer very closely, and we remain hopeful that the fund situation will improve and the fund will get allocated for us to liquidate the receivables and also for us to go ahead with the execution of the balance scope of the project.

And sir, how have been the pace of execution for this ensuing quarter, I think so this being a monsoon quarter, how do execution plan barring these 2 legacy and the UP projects, which you have outlined? How are the pace, if you could give some color? And also, sir, for the -- on a quarter-on-quarter basis also, our employee costs have moved up. So what would you attribute this? And what should it be on a yearly basis?

So on the first point, as you correctly said, this is the monsoon season. So clearly, for projects which have significant scope of current work on the outdoors, there will be an impact. We do projects all across the country. And some of the projects, especially in the construction phase have some impact. At the same time, there are parts of the project that work is happening indoors where we are able to progress at the expected pace of execution. So overall, we feel good about the execution that's happening across the board on the project -- the order backlog. Some part of the projects also are getting done outside India where the impact of the Indian monsoon would not be relevant. Coming to your second question...

On the employee cost -- one question also I have for Amit, sir. Amit Patniji (sic) [ Aankur Patniji ] but first you complete, sir.

Yes. So you possibly referring to Aankur Patniji, our Vice Chairman but...

Aankur Patni, yes, yes. Sorry, sir. Yes.

On the employee cost, it's a normal increase year-on-year that we are experiencing. At the same time, there are various other productivity measures that the company has kicked out, which we feel would help us balance that increase on the employee bucket. And again, this is a continuous process of action that the company takes to ensure that the overall cost is within the expected levels.

Mr. Patni, our company...

Sir, sorry to interrupt, may I request you...

Ma'am, only if I could add -- I could add only one point and then I can join the queue, ma'am. I do not have much time, if you permit.

Sir, may I request you to join the queue for a follow up-question. [Operator Instructions] The next question comes from the line of Tarun Agrawal from [indiscernible] Capital.

So my question is related to Roha greenfield. We have done a CapEx of INR 400 crores, and we have an asset turnover of 2.5x. So is it a fair understanding that by FY '28, we will be able to reach INR 1,000 crores in terms of revenue. And also adding another one. Just wanted to understand that how this Roha greenfield facility will be used to cater the export business for chemicals?

The asset turnover, as you have mentioned, will be 2.5x as and when we reach the full capacity, which we are expecting to reach over a period of around just under 4 years. But if you see that out of the total CapEx of INR 400 crores, INR 125 crores are towards the cost optimization measures, what we are introducing in the new facility. Our manufacturing base will be on a value of around INR 275 crores. So my asset turnover should be calculated on this figure. As regards to your second part of the question, I'll request Mr. Indraneel to address that.

So on the second question, as we said, this plant is primarily getting set up to cater to our exports business. As I said earlier in the call, we export to most of the geographies in the world, starting from U.S.A., Europe, Asia Pacific, Middle East. So we will -- and also part of this -- a smaller part of this will also be used to cater to our increased business in the domestic market. So that's where we expect this particular plant to cater to the demand.

The next question comes from the line of Omkar, an Individual Investor.

What is the revenue are you expecting from Roha plant in Q2 and full financial year? Requesting you to give some ballpark figure for this Roha plant revenue?

So Omkarji, as you would know that we don't share any specific data on any specific production facility or a specific business line. So we -- as we said earlier in the call, we expect the plant to be commissioned in second quarter, which is in this particular quarter. And we expect the plant to start shipping out products from the end of this quarter going forward. So we hope to ramp up capacity here. And this is a modern plant with all the latest technology. It's one of the -- would be one of the better plants in the region, and we expect volume to pick up. As and when we have more to share on this plant, we will come back but we do not talk about specific plant or business performance.

And sir, what is the next positive trigger for Ion Exchange as I have seen different Ion Exchange 3 years back. So something -- Roha plant, in my opinion, should be the turnaround. So do you expect as soon as Roha plant will start, our margin and overall business will reflect better than just now what we are seeing?

So we also feel -- we also hope for the same thing, and we'll continue to endeavor that all our segments, we are able to drive profitable growth across all our segments so that we are able to continue to cater to the interest of our shareholders.

The next question comes from the line of M.S. Reddy, an Individual Investor.

The answer to my question, I already got.

The next follow-up question comes from the line of Henil Bagadia from Equicorp.

I just have one question. Sir, are we optimized in terms of labor cost and other variable costs for the Consumer Product division? Or do we see further savings out there? And also, do we need -- are we fairly optimized in terms of the existing product portfolio? Or do you see any more further marginal investments other than the regular improvements, some significant kind of investments for the division?

It's a very intensely competitive segment that we are playing in. It's very important for us to ensure that we remain cost competitive to be able to, a, make the required top line and the improvement in the bottom line. It's also a segment, which is extremely dynamic and our competitors and the industry is always coming out with new technology and new product offerings. So it's very important for us to also remain relevant to look at opportunities in the market segments and come out with suitable offerings that will excite our targeted customer base. So we will need to continue to invest in new products and technology in this segment to maintain our current share or grow our current share in the Consumer Products division segment.

The next follow-up question comes from the line of Saket Kapoor from Kapoor & Company.

Sir, when we look at our shareholding pattern, we find that under the -- there are shares to the tune of 16% being held by the employee trust. So if Mr. Patni could just elaborate or anybody else could throw light on the nature of this trust? And whether as per the regulation, the trust will be there for perpetuity or we need to dilute the same over a period of time, which holds 16.18% equity of the company?

These are employee trust, which are holding shares for benefit of all the employees of the company. Trust have been existing since the '80s and '90s of the previous century, and there are no plans to dilute any form of equity from that.

Okay. So, sir, what is then the terms it will remain always with this and how will they get it accrued to the beneficiary? What's the process of these getting the benefit, how are the individual going to benefit out of it when the same remains in the trust only?

The income flow from the shares, which is dividend, that is what is used for the benefit of all the employees. And if at any point of time, there is any other form of cash accrual, which is directly attributed to these shares, these are for the benefit of all the employees of the company and would accordingly be distributed.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, we'll take this as the last question for today. I would now like to hand the conference over to the management of Ion Exchange (India) Limited for closing comments.

Thank you all for participating in the earnings conference call. I hope we have been able to answer your questions satisfactorily. If you have any further questions or would like to know more about the company, please reach out to our Investor Relations managers at Valorem Advisors. Thank you. Wish you a very good evening.

Thank you very much. On behalf of Ion Exchange (India) Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you all for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines.