Mahindra & Mahindra Limited (MM) Earnings Call Transcript & Summary
February 14, 2024
Earnings Call Speaker Segments
Anish Shah
executiveHi. Good afternoon, everyone. We are a couple of minutes passed, so we'll start now. And let me just take you through the highlights of the quarter, then we'll have Rajesh come in and talk about the Auto and Farm businesses, and Manoj will talk a little more about the financials. Overall, a very solid operating performance, excluding Tech M. You've seen the Tech M results, it's getting on a path for recovery and a turnaround now, but there's more work to be done. Obviously, a lot more work there. But besides that, Auto continues on a very strong momentum, gaining market share in SUV, up at 21% now; from a revenue standpoint, #1 in market share; and at 49.6% in LCV. So very strong performance on both of those fronts. Farm, while the industry has been tough and we expect it to be down 5% to 6% for this year, the business has actually gained 80 basis points of market share. And the level that we are at, at above 40%, that again is something that is very strong performance by the Farm team. Mahindra Finance turnaround is very much on track. GS3 is at an all-time low of 4%. You've seen the results from Mahindra Finance that were published. The credit costs are on track in terms of what has been committed, strong disbursement growth, sequential NIMs are up. So overall, the business is on a very solid track. And Tech M is the sore spot for this quarter. Profit is down 61% due to a number of factors, which were discussed in the Tech M call. But it's one where with the new CEO coming in, we are seeing very good signs of a turnaround. A number of things have been put in place already. So we shall expect much better results from Tech M as we go forward. In addition, our growth gem value unlock continues. We've launched India's largest renewables, InvIT, and that puts Susten in great shape to be able to deliver the growth that we want. We've got a large number of investors in, we had to say no to many of them as well. But as the business grows, we have the InvIT to be able to fund a large part of that growth in terms of the strategy we've outlined. Susten has performed very well this year. It's, in fact, much higher than the track we had outlined for it. We had talked about a 5x growth in Susten in 5 years. We are now looking at that and saying, should that be 10x or should that be somewhere in between 5 and 10. Second, from a Last Mile Mobility standpoint, we've got a second investment. The first was IFC. The second is NIIF's India-Japan Fund. And this comes in at a valuation of INR 6,600 crores, 10% higher than the first one, again, driven by strong performance in the business. As a result, overall, consolidated PAT is up 34%. This does exclude 2 items from last year. One was the Susten gain that we had as a onetime when Ontario Teachers came in and took the 30% stake and the entire company was revalued. And second is the trucks and buses impairment that was taken last year in the third quarter as well. So you see it on this slide here, where revenue is up 15% for the quarter, 17% year-to-date. And from a PAT standpoint, you see the net impact of the 2 offsetting parts, the plus that we had last year from the Susten gain and the negative that we had last year from the trucks and buses impairment, on a net basis, was a gain of INR 693 crores. Without that, it's up 34%; on a year-to-date basis, up 33%. We've talked about the 3 elements of our strategy. Capitalizing on market leadership in Auto and Farm, and you see that in the numbers here beyond market share, as we look at the profit increase is up 49% despite the slowdown in the farm industry. That's driven by market share, margin performance in Auto. And it's also setting the business up for the future with brand investments as well as product launches that have been done in Farm, that will be done in Auto for EV. Tech M and Mahindra Finance. We talked earlier, Mahindra Finance is on a good track now. Tech M has to get on that track and start its turnaround journey. And the growth gems, while you see the numbers here, profits are up 3.3x. But I'm a little less focused on these numbers, more focused on the value creation from the growth gems that we will see. And we again talked about LMM and InvIT. Lifespaces, I'd highlight, is doing on a very strong track in terms of sales and on a 5x growth path that we've set for it. So on balance, we've got our strategy working as we had planned it. And therefore, we go back to the commitments we've made. 18% ROE, we stay firm with that. We are 19% year-to-date. And from an EPS standpoint, we are a 40% CAGR over the last 2 years. We've taken away the F '21 number. Obviously, it will be a lot higher if we include that. But that was a low number, so we haven't included that in the EPS growth that we see here. With that, let me invite Rajesh for comments on Auto and Farm.
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveHi. Good afternoon, good evening, good morning, depending on where you are. Quickly walk you through the Automotive business first. And as you see in the Auto, we had a volume growth of 20%. The SUV part of it was close to 30%, which is 211,000. And the revenue market share is at #1 position for the quarter and YTD, April to September; and the quarter number is out there, 21%. LCV continues to be strong. And our LCV market share less than 3.5 tonnes is at 49.6%. We got the Automaker of the Year or Manufacturer of the Year, as they call it, at the Autocar Awards, a reflection of the multiple things that have happened in the Auto business. On the left side, you see a chart, which has the SUV volume growth. And we've been able to be #2 on volume in a category in which most of our products are priced much higher than competition, so -- and for 6 quarters in a row. Many of you have this question, why are we not playing in the low end of the market. We strongly believe that we should play where our strengths are, and our strengths allow us to be #2 on volumes even in a very competitive category, which the SUV market today is. And of course, we are #1 on revenue market share given our price per unit is much higher than everyone else. I guess this is the slide you all want a little bit more on. I'll talk a little on it now, but we'll take questions on it. So 226,000 booking numbers have come down. On one hand, that's good news because we wanted to bring down waiting periods. That is what the whole ramp-up was meant to be. So part of it is that. Part of it is December does see a higher cancellation rate. So what you're seeing here is a 10% cancellation rate for the quarter. That is partly spiked by December, which is the VINs changeover number. The January cancellation rate is back to less than 8%. So what are the things that have happened? And we can take more of this in the Q&A. So firstly, bookings. New bookings continue to be healthy at 50,000-odd per month. The daily supply average has gone up to 40,000. So obviously, your bookings are going to come down as your availability has moved up from the past, from 32,000 a month to 40,000 a month. So you're correcting the bookings by improved delivery. Cancellations did go up. And like I said, part of it is due to the VIN number. So on an overall basis, we would expect the bookings to be in this range. But the endeavor is to bring bookings down because if you really have to grow the business, it's not going to be easy to grow a business when a customer walks in and they hear that you're going to get the product after 10 months or 12 months or 8 months. That is not the nature of the market today. It may have been the nature of the market 2 years back, but it's not the nature of the market today. If we have to grow, we have to bring the booking numbers down. So my input to all of you is, it's not good news to have a good booking number. It's good news to have growth. So we want to be focused on bringing down this booking number with a period of time. And we can talk more on this in the Q&A. I'm sure this is the top-of-mind question for all of you. Where are we on capacity expansion? We had said we'll be at 49,000 capacity end of this financial year, that's the end of this quarter. We are on track for that. However, we don't expect to hit that number in the near future for 2 key reasons. One, we are ramping down the 300. And as you see that we are in a mid-cycle refresh, which is going to happen soon. So for the next 2 to 3 months, we will see a significantly lower volume of XUV300, which is one of our large selling products. So we're not going to see the spike in volume coming out of capacity. The second is there are some -- there is a variability between demand and specific models that we may have. So there will be some capacity mismatch. So what we've done is to give you an idea of what's going to happen next year. We've basically taken the SIAM projections for the industry, which is passenger vehicles at 3% to 4%, UV at 10% to 12%, and saying we will grow faster than that in mid to high teens. So that's, in a way, an expectation of where you should see us next year, and we can talk again more on that as we come to the Q&A. The LCV industry has, by and large, been flat through the year, a little negative in fact. But we've, as you can see, gained very good market share and got growths out of the ability to grow market share with a very refreshed or in actually all-new pickup portfolio, which has really helped us penetrate and gain share. The Last Mile Mobility, we just put this up, we have a wide and very strong product portfolio. Many more new products in the pipeline, a lot of work happening on product development in this space. There is increasing competition. And that's good news because the penetration of the L5 segment as we know it to be is only 11% still. So the ability to grow and penetrate this segment is going to happen with more competition, and we believe that is good because this is the segment out of all the Automotive segments, which has the best possibility for category penetration, and that will happen when more people come in and together drive growth. So we feel good about the fact that the industry will grow. Obviously, there will be some loss of market share. That's not significant at this point of time. And again, we can take more questions on that if you have. The volumes in this segment in quarter 3 were 11,600, where we grew 118%. In January, we grew 69%. The market share in this segment was 48.5% in quarter 3. It's back to 60% plus in January. So there are a series of things happening. And again, the message is huge upside on category growth, which will allow us to drive a strong growth in this segment. The consolidated numbers for Auto, revenue was up 26%, PBIT was up 91% without considering the impact of trucks and buses impairment, which has happened in last quarter. If we take that, then it is minus 95% for PBIT, but we're leaving that out of the equation. Margins, favorite topic, which all of you have questions on. So in quarter 3 of F '22, we had said we'll go up by 3% in something we have at least called the medium term, but that happened in 1 year, which is quarter 3 of F '23. And in quarter 3 of F '24, it's up by another 1.7%. So we have basically moved from 3.3% to 8.3% over this 2-year period. On FES, we all know the industry is down 4.9% in the quarter and about 4% for the year. In the quarter, we were down 4%; on YTD, we are down 2%. And we've gained 80 basis points of market share in the quarter. The rural economy is not having the best of time, but there are positives and negatives. So one key driver of rural economy is government spending index, an internal index we'd look -- we've created, which looks at all the spending that happens in rural. It's not just agri, it is all the spending that governments do in rural. We can see that curve moving up a little bit. And hopefully, that, for us, is a good indicator when you start seeing buoyancy. And you can see the downward curve, which is the time we've started seeing rural not as buoyant. The positive -- of course, all of you know the rainfall delay, shortfall, reservoir levels, all of that. The positive news is terms of trade are becoming positive. Output inflation is 6%, input inflation is 3%. So there is 3% positive terms of trade, which is normally, we have seen a very good sign of farmer sentiment. So that's one very positive news on the rural side right now. This is the market share trend just for you to see. Farm Machinery is continuing to grow at 29% in spite of rural being slow. We had said we want to -- we would feel good if we end this year at 40%. We may not get to 40% this year, but we feel we are on the right track at 30% plus. And as we see signs of rural economy pick up, we'll probably see much greater growth in this segment coming in. Revenue was flat, this is consolidated, and PBIT was down 9% in the Tractor segment. On core tractor margin, basically, we were at 16.9%. We had called out World Cup. We had said we have got a World Cup spend in quarter 3. We've not taken the impact of that on Auto side, of course, Auto spend as well. So we've not called that out as a percentage impact on Auto margins. But because it has a significant impact on tractors, we've called that out. So that's a 0.7% impact in the quarter of what we spend on World Cup advertising. So if we had not done that, we would have probably been at 16.9% plus 0.7%, which we believe is a good core tractor margin in the current context. So you see the same thing on this graph, which is something that we've been showing for a period of time, which is industry growth map with our margin and basically saying that our margins operate in a very narrow band of 17% to 19%, typically irrespective of what happens to industry in that quarter. And you can see that if it was 16.9% plus 0.7%, then we are in that 17.5% kind of band, even though we've seen industry down at minus 5.6% or minus 4.9% in this period of time. So with that, I'll hand over to Manoj. Thank you. Manoj?
Manoj Bhat
executiveThank you, Rajesh. Good evening, everyone. So I just have 2 short slides, and I think this one, Anish has covered largely in terms of the PAT. I think I just want to highlight 2 things. One is from a revenue perspective, while Auto and Farm, Rajesh did cover, but Financial Services saw a very good growth, about 24%, with Accelo growing about 21%. So multiple businesses are doing well from a perspective of contributing to the consolidated results. I think on the Susten and Trucks, the INR 693 crores is where -- was an impact in the last quarter. To look at the MTBD business, I think we had looked at -- performed a critical review and taken the charge last year, and that's an extraordinary item for -- was classified as extraordinary. But for purposes of comparison, the 34% is probably a more accurate number to look at. I think just another cut in terms of what are the -- what is the journey from INR 1,984 crores, which is a number which is excluding Susten as well as excluding the trucks and buses impairment, I think, clearly, Auto is a significant addition in terms of INR 721 crores of profits. Farm, as Rajesh mentioned, was slightly down, including I think there's an impact of the World Cup there. And if I look at Services, 2 things. First is Tech M, I think there has been a drop in profitability, and that's something we are working towards in terms of how do we get back on the journey of profit improvement. On Mahindra Finance, while the number looks down, I think last year, we had the benefit of some of the credit cost reversals coming through, which is absent this time. But otherwise, the business continues to do very well with the focus on credit costs and were much in line with whatever they had committed from a year-end perspective. And overall, growth gems, I think there's a small increase. I think the INR 147 crores is also there was some ForEx charge in the previous quarter, which is no longer there, a ForEx loss. So I think that's a quick journey from INR 1,984 crores to INR 2,658 crores. With that, I think we'll leave more time for questions because I think we don't have too many other events happening like some of the past quarters, so I thought we'll engage in more discussions. Thank you so much.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveAll right. We'll open it up for questions here and then move on to online as well. A fair bit of questions coming in there. So Kapil, do you want to just give them 2 minutes to settle down, and then we'll take questions. Okay. Somebody handing over the mics. There's a question there on the left, please.
Kapil Singh
analystMy question is, firstly, on the demand itself, we are looking at 3% to 4% growth for the industry for SIAM. If you could just look at the fact that UVs, we are talking of 10% to 12% growth, right? So basically, what we are implying is that some non-UV segment is probably going to decline in some sense. And if I look at M&M talking of 15% or, let's say, mid-teens to high teens kind of growth, then ex of M&M industry growth will be a very low number, right, if my math is right. So how are you -- is this forecast made bottom-up by SIAM? Or how is it done? And how are you as a company thinking about it?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveI had exactly the same sort of questions when I saw these numbers. And my follow-up to that was I want to see the modeling. So I've asked for the modeling, which has just come to me a day or 2 back. I mean, I maybe spend 2 minutes on those slides, but there is a modeling. So it is not some consensus view of talking to 5 OEMs and putting it together. There is a modeling that's gone. I mean, Veejay, I don't know if you've got a chance to go through what you sent to me, but...
Veejay Nakra
executiveIt takes a typical regression model into understanding where it looks at economic factors, it looks at agri factors. I think it also, along with that, takes into consideration what OEs are talked about, and they put all of that together to give out what they're forecasting. So there is a very clear regression-based model which they use to arrive at that forecast. It's not a unique modeling. It's typically what most economists would use in terms of arriving at the growth figures.
Kapil Singh
analystOkay. So for M&M, if you could talk about what's going on through the different models you've seen? As you were saying, the order books we see for some of the models, like 700 have seen a big dip. We've seen some upgrades also. So if you could just give some color on different models, how you are thinking about it? And also on electric vehicles, we've recently seen some price cuts. So is it becoming more cost competitive versus ICE or the competitive intensity is actually increasing? And how do you see the buildup versus -- because some of the players say that probably EVs will not be viable and hybrid should be a solution as well that should be looked at by the government. Yes, that's the question.
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveLots of questions. Let's quickly walk through the model-wise because I think that's also would be of interest to most people. So Thar has got a very strong -- continues to have a very strong order book. The longest waiting period we have in all our models right now is the 2-wheel drive Thar, but the new bookings are strong and the old bookings are very strong. The Scorpio Classic again continues to be extremely strong. Scorpio-N is strong as well. The Bolero has a few weeks, if at all, at waiting period. So that's more or less like not on a booking list and it hasn't been for the last few months, if you've seen that chart. What is going off from a number point of view is also 300 because there's really no -- we're not taking bookings on that now. So clearly, that whole thing is gone and that will come back when we come with the mid-cycle refresh. So that, I think, is one thing that you need to factor in that's not there right now. So that's one thing which is not there. XUV700, I'm going to spend a little bit of time because I think your question is also specifically around that. So I think we have 2 things that we need to do from an XUV700 point of view. One is signal that you don't have to wait for too long. Because one of the problems that we will have or we face as we ramp up wanting to get a big increase is the perception that you have to wait too long. So if the perception right now on XUV700, you've got to wait 12 months or 15 months because that's how it has been. Unless that perception changes, you're not -- now it's 2.5-years-old product. I mean, in August this year, it will be 3 years. So we do have to have people feeling that you can get this reasonably quickly in weeks, if not days. So one of the things we've done is to bring in this new model, which comes in with captain seats and so on and so forth, and we're making that available faster. So we are trying to signal that some models are available faster. I think the big thing that we need to do on XUV700 right now is we had the MX series. I don't know how many of you remember, and then we have the AX3, AX5. Because 80%, 85% of our orders went to the AX7, AX7L, in a way, the existing word-of-mouth on XUV700 is it's a INR 25 lakh product. Now we've got to open the funnel because we have product -- really good competitive products from INR 14 lakhs, INR 15 lakhs going up all the way. But because the whole first flush of demand and continuing to now continues to be on the higher-end version, we have to correct the feeling that this is a, whatever, INR 25 lakh product because this can play in against multiple set of competitors, and we've not got the chance to leverage that. So that's one of the things that we'll start doing. So in a way, we have this, in a way, a dilemma that we need to start marketing ourselves here because these are segments to open up. And we don't want to get locked in the mindset that we have to keep a booking period open. So we've actually proactively reached out to old 700 customers and seen whoever doesn't want to buy or buy the -- we've removed them from the booking list so that we are able to put ourselves in a mindset that we need to market ourselves in the right segments to get growth. So I'm coming back to saying what is important for us is growth, not a numeric booking number. And 700 is a very strong product. But if we have to -- there is no -- I mean, we have to think of the fact that we have right now 2 very strong products at volumes, which primarily the average price spend is INR 23 lakhs to INR 25 lakhs. There is no other product which is selling this kind of volume at that average price point, right? So in a way, we have brands. So we have to bring the average price point down to drive growth. Does that answer?
Kapil Singh
analystYes. On EVs and 400 as well?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveYes. No, the first part of your question was your -- I'm just kind of addressing that. So on the EV front, I think you're talking about the recent price drop and is it competition or commodities? I think it's a little bit of both. We did bring in the upgraded 400. I don't know if any of you had a chance to see that, it's looking really nice. And then competitors do react to moves that are made. So somebody has reacted to a move that we made. Of course, it's enabled by the fact that battery prices have gone down as well. I really don't think, right now, it's a competitive intensity thing because the size of the category is so small. I think it's roughly INR 3,000-odd a month in the category that we are talking, which is the price point these products are playing at. And we hope with the 400 that we have, we should get to about 25% market share of the small segment.
Kapil Singh
analystOkay. Just one last one, if I can squeeze in on profitability. Was there an impact of World Cup spend that we should think could be sort of not a normal spend for the Auto business as well? And if you're looking at 15% growth or higher than that, then should we expect operating leverage? And how are you thinking about playing the market in terms of -- do you want to keep the products affordable to drive growth? Or should we expect margins also to have potential to rise further?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveSo there was some World Cup impact on the Auto side. But in the overall scheme, it would have made a decimal -- smaller than a 0.7% decimal impact on Auto, so we didn't want to call it out specifically. But of course, there was an impact of World Cup in quarter 3 on Auto. To the point of view of next year, I don't want to answer that very specifically because, firstly, we have to go through our budget process and which will all happen now. But directionally, we would want to see growth. We do want our products to remain within access and that there are multiple ways to do that. It doesn't mean necessarily price drop. It is marketing variants, which we have in our portfolio today, which we haven't marketed because we were on a long waiting period. So I think there are multiple set of things that we need to do to drive growth. So growth is going to be important for us. And we have to use cost levers. And we always talk about the fact that cost is something which can be a bottomless pit, you just got to keep digging and finding cost, and we would continue to do that. So I think directionally, we would want to see growth and improve business performance. Anish, you want to add?
Anish Shah
executiveI'd just go back to your question, Kapil, on hybrid side versus EVs. We see hybrid essentially as an extension of ICE. And we had a choice, I mean, we could have gone into hybrid very easily. And we felt that EV was a better place to be because that is a technology for the future. That is dramatically different from ICE products, are much better, much more fun to drive. You've got a huge impact on emissions, a huge impact on operating cost; whereas if you look at all of those factors on hybrid, it's not dramatically different from ICE. Now there are certain markets around the world, Norway, for example, which is 90%-plus EV already. What is the noise coming from some other markets, which have hit 20% or so from an EV penetration standpoint? There are 2 parts. One is in cold weather, the range fluctuates quite significantly. And second is charging ecosystem is not as strong as it should be because people still have to wait for 30 minutes to charge a car. And sometimes if a charger is not working or you've got more people in line, it is a much longer wait and which is why folks are saying, I don't want to wait. That is the reality we will have to face on adoption of EV. And which is why governments around the world are incentivizing EV use because charging ecosystem as well as cars on the road will go hand in hand. As more cars come in, then charging ecosystem comes in. If one lags, the other will fall slightly as well. In India, today, we've got a very low penetration, 1.5% or maybe even lower. And therefore, we will see, first, people who can charge at home and charge at office by EVs. Then it will start moving towards getting a broader population of chargers in place. And as it comes, there will be a greater market that opens up. So that's what we modeled out saying it will go through that evolution in India as well and even globally, I think as ecosystem and charging technology. I was talking with someone in the battery space, and they said there is technology now that can charge 200 kilometers in 3 minutes, right? Now we've got to look at that in more detail and see, okay, what is required for that to happen? As that starts happening, and maybe it's there now or maybe it's there a few years later, but as that starts happening, then it's much more easier to do it. Then you will have petrol pumps around the world start putting up EV chargers because it takes the same economics in a sense to have a car come in and go out from a time standpoint. So those are going to be some of the challenges that we will see in EV adoption. I see us being able to go through each of those modules, but we'll have to work through that. It's not going to be an easy answer. It will have to be charging ecosystems comes together with the demand on the road. But EV is going to be the future. It'll go through some hiccups along the way, but that's really where the markets are going to end up.
Amarjyoti Barua
executivePlease.
Binay Singh
analystActually, just continuing on that, on the CAFE regulations or any emission regulations that are coming up, could you update us a little bit on that? And is there any sort of internal estimate about number of EVs you need to sell to meet the next CAFE norms or anything on that side?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveIn F '24, which is the current year, with whatever we have sold of 400 so far and what we will sell in Feb, March, we will comfortably meet the norms.
Binay Singh
analystAnd what is the next key milestone to watch?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveFrom by way of the number?
Binay Singh
analystOf the CAFE norms, yes.
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveThat is far away base. That is BS VII, there's no date yet right now.
Anish Shah
executiveThere is nothing between BS6.2 and BS VII.
Binay Singh
analystOkay. So even for CAFE after 2024, the '25, '26...
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveThey are the same, yes.
Binay Singh
analystSo in a way, you don't have to sell more EVs to meet that requirement?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveTo the extent at which our ICE grows, the number of EVs will go up marginally higher. So it is based on what you are selling in a mix of diesel, petrol, et cetera, et cetera. So that is what is used to -- say, how many EVs do you need to sell to offset and meet a certain CAFE norm. So that's a derived number. So what I'm telling you is for F '24, based on our current sales mix, whatever we've sold of 400 till now, plus what we are planning to sell in Feb, March, we should be comfortable.
Binay Singh
analystAnd secondly, just going back to rural. Earlier, we knew that M&M on the UV side also had a sizable rural exposure. So whenever rural would be reached, your UV portfolio would also get impacted by that, at least in the numbers now because urban is doing so well, it's not very visible. But is there any underlying data which makes you think that if rural was to rebound a year down the line, there are a few models which are sort of underserved now in those categories which could turn around? Or you don't see any rural slowdown in UVs?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveNo. I mean -- so Bolero is primarily a rural semi-urban model. And clearly, that hasn't seen growth this year, and it's possibly because of the state of rural. That being said, Scorpio Classic is also primarily a rural product, but it caters to a totally different target group, and that target group has a lot of money, right? So when we say there is rural economy is under pressure, it's not everyone in rural is under pressure, right? It's even when you look at urban, there are segments which are -- who are very rich and that's why we're seeing demand for certain kind of vehicles. And there is maybe the salaried class or some smaller businesses who are postponing buying of vehicles. So you see that in urban as well. And so that would be -- that is affecting us in products like Bolero, but it doesn't affect us in a product like Scorpio Classic, which is primarily really rural. Even Scorpio-N, I think, Veejay, 40% plus rural. So it's not -- it has a very high rural presence as well, and we don't see a stress in these segments there.
Binay Singh
analystRural segment, [ 52% of SUV is in rural ]...
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveYes. Yes.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveThanks, Binay.
Anish Shah
executiveSo we'll see some bounce back on Bolero...
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveYes, Bolero. And even 300, to some extent, when it comes in because that has also, I think, almost 35%, 40% semi-urban rural. Yes, but not dramatic.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveHitesh?
Hitesh Goel
analystThis is Hitesh from CLSA. Sir, 2 questions. First, on this Red Sea issue. So we started hearing from people that there's 55, 60 days of delay in machinery coming to India because of container not coming in time and all that. So are you seeing any issues in your supply chain or something on container or parts shortage? That is the first question. Second question, I'll talk on tractors later.
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveYes. So let me take this. So Red Sea issue has basically 3 implications. One is cost, second is exports and third is imports of material or equipment. On cost, we are covered with contracts, to a large extent, but anyway, the impact is not significant on materials. That's not a big deal. On exports, we've had some impact to get the new OJA for launch to North America. So -- but the delay is predictable now. It's 4 to 5 weeks. So we would factor that in. So there's no real business impact once you know that it's a delayed cycle of 4 to 5 weeks. On the incoming material, raw material now, we are kind of covered with having proper inventory in place, some contracts which prioritize shipments in. So at this point of time, we are not seeing any supply chain disruption risk coming on. That doesn't mean that it won't ever happen, but right now, we are not seeing that. I haven't heard of any capital equipment. I don't know if you heard of that is getting delayed because of Red Sea.
Hitesh Goel
analystMy second question is on tractor. So Vahan is showing pretty good growth in tractor retail. Other companies are also talking about that this number is not right. So if you can give us some sense on tractor retails, what is happening? And where is our inventory levels? And my second part of the question is also on that Farm equipment, when do we see profitability on the Farm equipment side? At what revenue we break even?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveYes. So on the first part, I'm not answering the question of Vahan context, but more on retail momentum context and stock levels. Typically, billing is worse than retail in our down cycle. We know that. So the retail growth is not as -- retail negative is not as bad. And in the festival season, we actually saw positive retail growth in the festival days, what we count, start of Navaratri to Diwali. So right now, it is many people, including us, adjusting stocks, which brings the industry level downward. And I think that's the right thing to do, preparing, keeping in mind the current sentiment that's prevailing. We typically like to be at about 30-days stock for tractors with dealers. We are a little higher than that and not too much higher, a little higher, which we will correct in the next 3 months or so. We have been correcting the last couple of months, and we will correct it over the next 2 to 3 months. So we typically like to be at 30. We're a little above that right now. So we do need some correction.
Hitesh Goel
analystThe Farm Machinery?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveThe Farm Machinery, sorry, I missed that. The Farm Machinery, I don't know if we want to share a number of breakeven, but it's very much on our mind. And as a direction, maybe we are like 1.5 years or 2 away from being able to break even with the current growth plans that we have.
Anish Shah
executiveAnd it will have meaningful contribution after that because that's one of the things we are driving to say that with the investments we are making in that, it should have a meaningful contribution on that as well.
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveThe industry itself is -- I mean, the players who are there, current competitors do have a decent margin profile. So it's not like the industry doesn't have a profit pool. So once we get our momentum going and our product strategy and material costs optimized over the next 2 years, there's no reason why we won't make money in this industry. There is a profit pool in the industry amongst current competitors.
Anish Shah
executiveYes. And right now, the cost is also higher because of the investments to grow share across multiple products. So that's one factor that's driving it. And we're not shy of making those investments right now because we feel that there's a huge market here that we can really benefit from.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveI'll take one question, Gunjan. Just give one question from online, and then we'll come back to you. So Pramod Kumar from UBS. Actually, it's a 2-part question, one for Manoj and the second one for Anish. Manoj, the question is, are there any nonoperating income expenses like mark-to-markets, divestments, et cetera, in the segmental performance this quarter that you wanted to highlight?
Manoj Bhat
executiveSo I think if you look at what is impacting the stand-alone segmental, there is dividend income, which is classified as operating under the new standards. And that is the only big item. There is some INR 36-odd crores of -- there's one investment of ours which got listed in the U.S., which was Zoomcar. There's some reversal of impairment of INR 36 crores. So broadly speaking, there's not much of an adjustment this quarter except for the dividend income, which comes into the IBCS segment. Sorry, the other item is, of course, we have KG Mobility and RBL which we mark-to-market every quarter. So there is a gain coming from that, which is shown as other income, it's not shown as operating income. So it's not in the operating income from a segment perspective.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveNot in segment results, in the consolidated. Anish, a question for you is, Classic Legends, given its performance, would fall more in the divest bucket the way you thought about capital allocation or laid out capital allocation in the past. So what makes you believe we should put money in there?
Anish Shah
executiveSo Pramod, on that, our capital allocation was always based on can we make money in this business in the future, not as much on is it making losses right now. And while we did exit a number of businesses, we also turned around a number of businesses. And therefore, this is one we actually feel very good about. We think the products are outstanding. These are very good brands. There have been some hiccups in the past couple of years that we've gone through. And today, we feel that it's well poised to grow, which is also the reason why we put in a commitment to put additional capital over the next 3 years. And not just us, but we had external investors coming in as well, which is part of what we've been doing with many of our growth gems. And that is external validation for us to say that it's not just us believing that something can grow, they're putting their money behind it also and believe that it's going to grow significantly. So it's one business where, hopefully, we can come back and show great value creation, and I'm confident we will. And that's the reason why we put it as, what we would call, category A, which is invest and keep.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveGreat. Gunjan, please go ahead.
Gunjan Prithyani
analystBefore I get to the questions, Manoj, just clarification on this INR 36 crores, the number that you called out. I assume this is all in the investment. None of it is in the Auto and the Farm segment, right?
Manoj Bhat
executiveNo, it is an investment.
Gunjan Prithyani
analystOkay. Just going back to the order backlog which we have, now we clearly have capacity mismatch in Thar and Scorpio. And Thar, we will go ahead and launch the 5-door model as well. So if you can just talk about how are we still thinking about capacity ramp-up for these 2 models because that's where the biggest backlog lies?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveThar is one model. Which is the second? Scorpio?
Gunjan Prithyani
analystScorpio. Yes. Because the booking run rate, if I see, is still much higher than the monthly capacity that you had laid out.
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveYes. So on Thar, there is -- basically, we have roughly, out of the current sales that we do, which is about 6,000-odd a month, roughly half is 4-wheel drive and the balance is 2-wheel drive. A lot of the bookings are on the 2-wheel drive. We are not able to right now ramp up 2-wheel drive production because of the engine-related capacities there, not the assembly line or the manufacturing-related capacities, right now beyond 3,000. That will move up with time because that's a very specific engine-related capacity, which is what's -- the 1.5 liter, which goes on the rear-wheel drive of the 2-wheel drive. So that's the specific constraint that we have in being able to increase the volume of the Thar 2-wheel drive. But overall, as a portfolio, we think it's a very good balance where 50% of our volume is coming from 2-wheel and about 50% continues to be on 4-wheel drive, which is a very good sign because that means people do see value of paying the extra money, half of the people to go into a 4-wheel drive. The Thar 5-door capacity is a separate capacity we've shared earlier, and that will kick in when we're ready to launch that sometime in the middle of next year or this year, rather, middle of this calendar year. So that's specifically on Thar. On Scorpio Classic, we are -- that's one area where we have a constraint because we're getting very good momentum, and we were not anticipating that we will get an uptick. In fact, most people thought Scorpio Classic will disappear when Scorpio-N comes. It's actually got stronger. So we are doing some capacity tweaking to increase the capacity, but not significantly. So that -- I think that is a product which will continue to be kind of in the region of what it is, which is right now between 4,000 to 4,500 kind of volume. The Scorpio-N, most of the capacity debottlenecking is -- has happened. There, it's -- we are having a variant mix issue, which is where the orders are versus what we are. So a lot of the orders that have come in are on the mid- to lower-end versions, which is good for the long term, but we had not ramped up those versions as much. So that's the product on which we have a variant mismatch issue, which we'll fix as we go along.
Gunjan Prithyani
analystOkay. Got it. The other question, Anish, was on the electric portfolio. Now we'll start the product rollout from December onwards as we've called out. There have been multiple speculations around we not going ahead with Volkswagen, we are looking at battery setup. So if there's anything to refresh on the progress towards the strategy, are we still on track with respect to the launches? And any alliances that are worth calling out?
Anish Shah
executiveSo everything is on track as we had planned it. No deviation from that. Rajesh, do you want to add on?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveYes. And on the VW piece, there was some news handle which had reported that there's a -- and VW clarified the next day with a statement that there's no change in whatever we are doing with M&M. So that continues.
Gunjan Prithyani
analystBattery, is there a thought process to evaluate that?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveYes. So we've said in the past that we would at some stage have a conversation with VW on localizing sales in India. That hasn't made a lot of progress yet. It doesn't mean that's not happening. But that's the next stage of work that we need to get to. VW right now has multiple of these giga plants coming up around the world. So they have a bit of a bandwidth issue. They need to get that going before they can start focusing on the India piece of that, but that's something that we will evaluate whether we would do that with a partner going forward.
Anish Shah
executiveYes. Right now, for the foreseeable future, we are set in terms of commitments that we have on that. And we want to look at the next phase after that to say, should we have our own battery plant or not. So we -- the inclination is that we should, I'd just sort of put that out there. But we need to verify that inclination through a lot of data and analysis and say, what are the benefits of doing it, what are the risks of doing it, and then on that basis, make that final call that we should do it. And then the questions are with whom, what are the technology, all of those things that come in with that. And then I would just also add the EV products have come out very well, and we'll make sure that you have a chance to test drive them. I've test driven 3 of them and just very happy with where we are right now on this.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveJust combine a few questions online while that is circulating because they're in the same theme. Rajesh, this is for you. In general, questions are coming from SBI Pension Funds, Abhinav; Mukesh Saraf from Avendus, Viraj, they're all asking what the outlook for tractors is for Q4 and next year?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveQ4 is minus 10%, and F '24 is minus 5% around. F '25, too early to call.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveOkay. All right. So then a question for you, Anish, as well online, and I'll come back to the room after that. This is from Viraj and his question is, INR 15,000 crores of net cash and likely to grow. What are your plans for that cash?
Anish Shah
executiveI'm surprised that question didn't come up earlier. See, look, the one good thing is that we have not been going off and spending that, as some of you would say. And we've been very disciplined in ensuring that what we do is on track with what we've committed. We are looking at a phase of what I would call exponential growth possibilities. And that's something we've talked about with our growth gems. We've talked about a 5x growth plan that we would have for that. We haven't had to put a lot of capital in it so far because we've had capital coming from the outside for that. So Last Mile Mobility, we were ready to put that capital in, but we had people really pushing us to say, we want to come in and we want to give you capital for it. So we don't need to put capital in into Last Mile Mobility. Similarly, for Susten with the renewables, InvIT, that we've got in place, we've got a great growth plan for that business, but we don't need to put additional capital right now. As we think about Holidays, Lifespaces, Logistics, all 3 are businesses which can easily grow 5, 7x from where we are right now. Now we may get someone else to put in capital as it happens or we may put in some capital ourselves, but those are businesses we want to invest in. Classic Legends is one we want to invest. Again, we didn't have to put in all the capital that we needed to because others came in along with it. So we will look at growth to really take us to the next level as a company. What we are very conscious of, in my mind, capital allocation is not -- we will not invest. Capital allocation is we will get the returns of where we invest. And that's something I tried to clarify earlier also when we had some discussions around it because if everything we had invested in the past actually gave results, everyone would have been very happy with it. The fact was it didn't, and we got lessons from there as to why should we be careful in certain areas and what we need to do before we invest in certain areas. So our approach is as follows: one, be very careful about where we invest; ensure that we have all the capabilities required to win in that space and that we can deliver returns in that space; and then whatever plans we lay out in terms of saying we're investing to get these returns, we actually deliver on them. That's our approach to it. Now where will we invest? To start with, our current businesses, because we've got huge potential across our current businesses. EV is an investment. Farm Machinery is an investment. Mahindra Finance needs just core operating rigor right now, which is what it's focusing on, so it doesn't need investments in that sense. Tech M needs core operating rigor, it doesn't need investments. Our growth gems need investment because they've got huge potential for growth. So that is where we're going to look at putting cash behind it. Would we do something beyond that? At this point, we are not focused on it. But if something really meaningful comes up where we say that the Mahindra Group can actually make a big difference in this space and we feel we can deliver on it, we will look at it at that point in time. But that's where we are right now. And I would also add that we feel that where India is poised today, there is room for tremendous growth. And having a war chest to be able to drive that growth is something that will be very positive for us. At the same time, I do want to say that, that does not mean that we're going to go up and invest in 10 different areas. We're going to be very, very careful, as I just mentioned earlier, about where we invest and how we invest.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveAny questions in the room because there are a fair bit online?
Anish Shah
executiveThere's one.
Nitij Mangal
analystThis is Nitij Mangal from Jefferies. Two questions. Firstly, on the tractor side, can you -- I know you don't want to talk about FY '25 outlook yet. But do you have -- are you thinking about what are the outer bounds in terms of what can be the extent or the length of this down cycle? And what would you look at to assess that demand is coming back?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveSo let's think of what are going to be the positive enablers. One clear positive enabler is going to be a better monsoon than what we saw this year. Both the reports that have come out right now, the first reports, and I'm still saying it's too early to call because we know these reports keep getting upgraded and updated as you come closer to the time, both Skymet and IMD are talking about a positive -- I mean, a normal monsoon this year, which is going to be good news from multiple points of view, especially reservoir levels have dropped after a very long time below their LP average, which is now this time at minus 5%. So we would want to see -- there is going to be an effect of positive monsoon that will have on the sentiment and overall buying in the economy -- in the rural economy. So I think that's one factor. I said the farmer terms of trade are positive, which is a positive enabler. Some of the base effect has got corrected because tractors saw a 27% growth and then we've seen 2 years of a down cycle. So in some way, we've seen a stabilization of the base a little bit. Next year is going to have Navaratri's back. This year, as you know, we had -- didn't have April and we didn't have March. So you kind of lost out on 2 fronts, which is one of the reasons why there's going to be a negative growth in this quarter because last year, March, there was Navaratri. This year is going to spill over into April and then get a second one, I think, 5 days at the end of the -- 2 days at the end of March spilling over into April. So you're going to -- that's going to be a positive festival-based enabler for F '25 as well. So I'm just putting out all of these things. Obviously, we'll look at all of these. That being said, there are years -- and as some of you know, I spent 7 years doing tractors only. There are years when we -- I thought the industry will be minus 5%, it became plus 20%. There are years I thought it would be plus 20%, it became minus 5%. After 7 years, I've learned to say it's too early.
Nitij Mangal
analystI think we have experienced that. Secondly, on the SUV side. One, can you remind us what are the ICE launches you have from here? And also, do you think there is a need to address some midsized kind of an SUV price point like where XUV500 used to be? So is that your lower-variant XUV700? Or do you think you need one more kind of nameplate, maybe not all the way down, but somewhere in the mid-category?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveSo first, just to reassure all of you, we'll share more detail in May. We are very mindful that we need a strong ICE portfolio. Even if EV penetration reaches 20% to 30% 3 to 4 years from now, it's still 80% of a very large chunk of business is going to be ICE. So we are very invested in ICE. We -- like I've shared earlier, we can't talk as much about it because it will have immediate cannibalization effect on our current products, right, which we don't have that problem in EV. So it's okay to talk about, okay, this is what we're going to do on EV. So we are always a little more guarded about sharing our ICE plans. That being said, we have 2 big launches coming up this year, which you are already aware of. One is the Thar 5-door and the other is the mid-cycle refresh of 300. So that's already on the anvil. We think both of these are going to do very well. They've really come out well. And as you see them come through, we say with conviction that they're going to do extremely well. To your specific question on, should you do an XUV500 kind of price point? That is one way to look at it. The other is, should you do, as what many people say, a 4.3-, 4.4-meter SUV? That's another question that comes up. The way we kind of -- I think price -- for me, price point is a better way to think about it. How can we create exciting products at a given price point? And that's the endeavor that we have, right? So when we think about why Thar rear-wheel drive, it was not an easy decision to say should we take Thar into 2-wheel drive. The perception is, okay, will it dilute the brand? When people think about Thar as a pure off-road or 4-wheel drive, is it a good idea to do Thar 2-wheel drive? I mean it was something we grapple with. It wasn't an easy decision. But then we said, if you really want this category to grow, there are going to be many, many people who want to own a Thar who don't necessarily want to take it out into the mountains every weekend. And -- but we are able to create a price point with that. We are able to create INR 11 lakh, INR 12 lakh price point, which is what has enabled exponential growth in that category. So we are very, very mindful of price points. If you look at all our products, they have price points which enable us to compete and get volume. Unfortunately, if I may use that word, but it still remains an opportunity on XUV700, we couldn't leverage our lower price point product because the whole demand just swung so much to the higher end that there was no chance to produce the lower end. And everyone forgot, including our teams, that we actually had lower-end products because for 1.5 years, we could not sell it. We were into answering questions on when we do get your current delivery. Now that we are getting out of that phase and as we are ramping up production, we have to start selling our lower price point products of 700, Scorpio and so on and so forth. And they are all in the 500 price point. The 500 price point was, I think, INR 14 lakhs to INR 17 lakhs or INR 12.5 lakhs to INR 17 lakhs. So we have enough products in that price point, and that's going back 4 years. Corrected to inflation, we have a very good portfolio with significantly better technology and product now in the 500 price point.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveA couple of questions from online. Anish, this one's for you. PayTM Financial Services, anything there that interests you?
Anish Shah
executiveOne-word answer, no. That's my answer.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveNext question for you, Rajesh, is -- and there are multiple questions. I'm just trying to simplify this. Is there a mix impact of Swaraj versus Mahindra that's playing into the tractor margins?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveI'll try and answer that a little differently. It is not a mix impact of Mahindra versus Swaraj. It's a mix impact of South versus others. So typically, if you look at the Southern markets for tractors, we sell higher horsepower tractors in South, which typically have a better margin profile, both Swaraj and Mahindra. Because all the South markets, Maharashtra, I think, has been minus 30%; Telangana, AP have been minus 25% to minus whatever percent; Karnataka has been minus 20%, these are all strong markets. These are all tend to be a mix effect coming out of South versus the rest of the country. And that -- I think the answer is more that rather than Swaraj versus Mahindra.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveThank you for that. Also a question on -- you answered this in the media queries as well, just plans for MTBD and where do you -- or sorry, the trucks and buses business and where do you see it going?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveI'll start and maybe, Anish, if you want to add. So the trucks and buses business is something we are focused on reviving, and it's starting to show very good signs. Market share has moved up from 2.2% to 3.2-odd percent, which is on a small base, but it's a very good sign. In the 40-odd top dealers that we have actually, 8 or 10 of them have more than 10% market share. So what that means is when we have a channel member who's committed to the business, we can easily move our market shares up. So for us, that's in a way a kind of green shoot. So we are able to see momentum picking up. We are at the moment in a very focused strategy. So we are saying, okay, here are 40 dealers, let's increase the market share in 40 dealers first. Then we add another 40 dealers, so on. So it's a very, very focused strategy to say, let's strengthen the channel as we build our market share. It's not like we are trying to do this everywhere at the same time because then we are not going to get channel viability. So the first thing is to say, take a critical mass of dealers, get their market share to a critical level so they get channel viability, they get interested in our business, they're able to -- we are able to use that to demonstrate success to other dealers and then we will add 40 and 40 and so on. So right now, we are taking a very calibrated approach on how to build volumes, show success and then start replicating that. We have a very good product portfolio and head to head, we do very well. And we are confident that we will move shares of this up significantly in the next 12 to 15 months. It's already a INR 3,000-plus crores business by way of revenue at 3% market share. So just if you're able to get to 7%, 8%, which is not difficult, we were 5% before COVID. So if we can get to 7%, 8%, it's a INR 10,000 crore business. So it becomes very substantial. There is enough profit pool in the industry. So once you cross 7%, 8%, there's going to be money to be made. So we -- and Anish will add to this, and we went through a full review of whether this is a business we want to stay in or not. Clearly, we want to because INR 10,000 crores is not easy to build. It's easy to -- it is possible for us to make this a INR 10,000 crore business, and there is profit pool once you cross a certain threshold. So I think we are very committed to make this work, and we believe that this can be a big potential top line and bottom line driver. Anish?
Anish Shah
executiveYes. We're the leader in LCV, and we feel that we have capabilities to be able to lead or gain a much better position in MHCV as well. And that's the reason for staying with this business. So we did look at it closely, and we did consider whether it makes sense to exit or to stay. And based on the potential we saw, we said we should stay. The business is on track right now in terms of the turnaround we had identified for it, and it's moving well. And that should be able to give us significant benefits going forward.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveGo ahead, Rakesh.
Kumar Rakesh
analystRajesh, I had just one question on the tractor business. In the past, when the down cycle have played, we have usually seen a very sharp drawdown on the volume. But this time, we haven't seen so far flattish volume then slight decline this financial year. So a, do you see a risk of a sharp drawdown on volumes still possibly next year? Or b, do you have some understanding of the underlying demand drivers, which may possibly have changed now and, hence, that kind of high cyclicality may not be there in demand?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveThat's an interesting question. Let me try and think of how to answer it. The way I -- based on my experience, I think the sharp drop happens when retails drop very sharply and then the manufacturers have to do a disproportionate correction in inventory. I think this time, retails have not dropped disproportionately. So the retails are probably in the minus 3%, minus 2% kind of region, which is not bad. So you -- the level of extent of stock correction needed by the industry is not that high. I think with evolution of the overall multiple set of industry players, some with now international partners, there's much greater discipline on the kind of stock each OEM is building compared to what may have happened in the past. So the stock buildup with the dealers is not as high as that has happened earlier. People are taking corrections along the way and which is why you're seeing a little bit smoother curve than what we used to see in the past. In the past, basically, people will wait for a desperate time when you can't get money from the dealers to say, now I have to cut stock. I think people are now cutting proactively and not waiting for complete collapse of the payment turnaround cycle and then say, now I need to. Only way I'll get money is if I stop billing. I think nobody is reaching that stage yet, and I think that's the reason why you're seeing a flatter curve. But I may be wrong, but this is my current read that much greater discipline among OEMs, proactive correction along the way and retail hasn't dropped. Suppose next year, we go into like a 15% retail drop, you're going to see a very sharp correction. Hopefully, that's not going to happen because I'm not -- I think the enablers for next year are stronger than the dis-enablers, unless we have a very bad monsoon.
Anish Shah
executiveThe other point I'll add here also, and this is based on some level of data, more of a hypothesis and may be worthwhile for you to look at the hypotheses and see if it makes sense, government has -- the government budgets over the last few years have been, what I call, very much economics-driven, not politics-driven. And therefore, there haven't been a large amount of SOPs that have been given out. That sometimes creates a high degree of variability from time to time as well. If you look at the first year after COVID, from March '20 to April '21, government spending in rural went up significantly. And rural was very buoyant at that time. The tractor industry grew 27% that year. But the government has been very methodical about not giving out too many political SOPs and ensuring that it's setting up the economy for the long term. And in doing that, my sense is the variability will be a lot lower because you're not going to see that high upside and downsides after that.
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveI think also tractor subsidies have come down a lot, which is, I think, very good for the industry. It will be -- you're seeing spikes because of that, but are basically preponement or sale at lower margin. So I'm actually very happy that the state subsidies on tractor buying have come down a lot.
Kumar Rakesh
analystIs there any change in the use cases as well, which predominantly used to be agriculture-driven, that is something which you also use?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveYou mean agriculture versus mining versus haulage? Not so much in the last 2, 3 years. I think a lot of that change happened in the 3, 4 years earlier. I think it's kind of more stable right now. In the last 3 years, I don't think the mix has changed a lot.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveAny questions in the room? If not, we'll wrap up with -- okay, a couple.
Kapil Singh
analystCould you just comment on the LMM business? Is it showing up in financials in the stand-alone? Or you would -- how would you report that? And also, just on the business environment there, we heard some competition is coming in and they've also talked about taking away market share. So how is the market share scenario for that business?
Anish Shah
executiveManoj?
Manoj Bhat
executiveSo I'll pick the LMM question first. So it's a subsidiary, so it doesn't come in stand-alone. Having said that, I think most of the moving pieces have now moved to the subsidiary. So now the baseline is proper in between. If you go to Q1, Q2, maybe the baseline wouldn't have been the proper baseline. But now largely, everything has moved where it has to move into LMM. So I think -- so it will be part of the consolidated and not part of the stand-alone. What we, however, do and whenever we show that, maybe we'll have to decide how do we do it. Because when you think of cash, et cetera, we're still thinking that there is cash in LMM and MEAL and stand-alone because it's really all fungible cash in that sense. So we are working through that thing. But otherwise, from a P&L perspective, it's gone to consolidated.
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveJust to add, I think till 10th September or whatever that -- till 31st August, the numbers were within M&M. After that, I think -- so quarter 2 may be a little confusing because something would have moved to subsidiary. Quarter 3 is fully stand-alone subsidiary and hence, in consolidated only. I added 3, 4 bullet points on that slide anticipating this question from all of you. So maybe I'll play that back again. Yes, of course, there is competition, and it's a strong competitor, so that's good. Strong competition always enables categories to grow. This category needs growth. We are all going to get growth only when the category grows. Like I said, EV penetration right now is, in that category, is 11%. It has potential easily to go to 30% to 50% very soon. That is going to happen when you have 2 or 3 players who are working very hard to make -- improve penetration, improve finance package, improve perception of how good an electric is because it's word of mouth which gets inflection point in these kind of segments, which are very commercially driven. And that word of mouth will move very quickly as you start seeing more vehicles plying on the road. And I think competition is going to be really good for the category, so we welcome them. Yes, we may lose a few share points here or there, but we are still the very strong leader. And as you saw in January, our market share is decent, and we hope to be at a very decent market share. But really the measure for this is going to be how quickly we are able to grow, not so much what is the absolute market share because as you have competitors and if the category grows very quickly, it's going to be a very large pie for everybody to have enough of. I don't know if that specifically answers your question.
Kapil Singh
analystYes. If you could also touch upon the profitability of EVs for LMM as well as how you think about for the SUV business as well? Just general thoughts, that would be helpful.
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveSo firstly, we do qualify for PLI. We have qualified for PLI. So we met all of that as M&M, which covers us for SUVs and LMM as a conceptual thing. On LMM, we've got our products approved. Now we are at the final stage. I'm specifically spending some time on PLI because it is going to have an impact on how you think about profitability. So in LMM, the products are fully ready. We are waiting for MHI to release the final SOPs and then we go in. And quarter 1, we can get the first disbursement done. So that's where we are on LMM. On SUVs, which is specifically 400, we will meet the value addition norm by the second quarter of F '25 as we complete the localization and a few other things. So that's when we will apply for PLI on 400. Right now, we don't meet that. So we're not going to get PLI benefit at this stage. LMM has -- so LMM has the benefit of PLI and the FAME both. In the SUV business for us, since we don't play in the fleet segment, it's -- and we are above a certain price point, we will be primarily getting PLI. The -- I think in LMM, there is a clear set of money to be made. The key thing is how quickly and aggressively do you want to look at growth versus using the money you have to drive growth versus to kind of say, okay, there's a lot of money to be made if you grow conservatively. So I think that's the balance we'll kind of work out as we go along. We have 2 investors, we'll get their views as well. Clearly, we have cash, and that's the reason we have cash. So cash is not all for CapEx. Some of it can be used to fund aggressive growth as well. But we have to get that balance right. So that is something we'll settle in as we move along over the next quarter or 2. But there's clearly right now, based on price and material costs, there's money to be made. On the SUV side, I think we'll see how this plays out in BEV as the BEVs come in, and we'll talk more about that as we come along. Clearly, they're not going to have the same percentage margin, as we've said earlier, because there is no GST in the denominator. The GST is different rather than the denominator. So we will not be able to compare percentage margins on electric versus ICE. But we have to think of how we are going to be able to communicate this to all of you so you are able to understand this. So we'll probably show you EV and ICE separately in a way that you can understand this because if you try to weigh the margins, it's going to be very confusing because the percentages can't be comparable.
Kapil Singh
analystAnd BEVs will be qualifying for PLI with the localization right from start?
Rajesh Kajuria
executiveThat's the plan. I don't know right from start, but yes, directionally, I mean from start, yes, maybe a few months to get your paperwork and estates. It's not easy paperwork. I mean that's -- we've learned that.
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveOne last question to wrap up. This is from a retail investor, very apt question, I think. Given everything the group is going through, the focus on growth, et cetera, Anish, what are your thoughts about Mahindra making an international standard F1 car?
Anish Shah
executiveNo. We are focused on what we are doing. You know exactly what we are doing. And as I said before that we have to deliver on what we've committed. If we find something outstanding, one new area to get into, we may look at that. But again, may is the operative word. But the key is we're going to deliver on what we said we would. So...
Amarjyoti Barua
executiveAll right. Thank you, everybody, online as well as here in person for your participation, and we'll see you in May for the total year view.
Anish Shah
executiveThanks, everyone.
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