Mahindra Lifespace Developers Limited (MAHLIFE.BO) Q1 FY2026 Earnings Call Transcript & Summary

Good evening, everyone. A very warm welcome. We are here to discuss about our Q1 FY '26 earnings update. At the outside, I would like to thank everyone for participating. With us, we have Mr. Amit Sinha, MD and CEO; Mr. Vimalendra Singh, CBO, Residential; Mr. Vikram Goel, CBO, Industrial; and Mr. Avinash Bapat, CFO. So it's been a good quarter for us and key highlights include some of the GDV and the launches we had on the resi side and a strong leasing activity on the IC & IC business. And also the rights issue we just completed during the quarter. Like last time, we will start with a presentation and followed by Q&A. And I would like to welcome Amit to start the presentation.

Hello, guys, can you hear me at the back? Okay. I'll go through briskly. Thanks again for joining. I think we shared this slide last time around. So I think there's not much that has changed in terms of our strategy, our aspiration and our plan to achieve a target of INR 10,000 crores last time we had shown the path to INR 10,000 crores by FY '30. And that's captured in these 6 boxes in terms of the choices that we are making, the kind of effort we are putting into the BD engine. A lot of deals come our way now. And fortunately, for us, we are many times first port of call for many deals. Customer experience continues to be a priority, not only at Mahindra Lifespaces, but at Mahindra Group. We take that very seriously. We are doing many things on the design front, but also in terms of the overall customer experience through the life cycle. Project execution is where everything comes together. We have a very, very, I would say, disciplined tracking of our project pipeline. The projects that are being executed as well as a project that are being launched. IC is a key area for us. We have a business officer Vikram Goel, who joined us very recently joining this meeting for the first time, right? And that's an area we are also looking to expand given the momentum that we have seen in the last few months. And all of this come together with a very solid financial discipline that we have in terms of tracking the IRRs of our project, capital allocation between across our projects, choosing the right set of deals that are capital efficient and suitable for us to pursue the right set of growth metrics. And then we are -- we talked about funding last time around, fortunately for us, the rights issue has been quite well received, and we already deployed some of the capital we received already. So, all of that is part of our strategy. So not much change. I just wanted to recap for us. I think you may know most of this, but from our point of view, a one-page summary of the real estate market. Demand continues to be healthy. Wherever we have been able to launch projects, we have not had any problem in terms of selling. Obviously, recent RBI repo rate has given us some tailwinds, but that tailwind is only ensuring the extension of the healthy demand that we have seen in the past several years. Inventory overhang has come down. It's slightly higher than the last quarter data that we received. It used to be between 12 and 13 months. It's around 14 months. And -- but overall, this level of inventory overhang is something which we consider quite healthy for the industry. One of the challenges that we have seen is the number of launches have come down for multiple reasons, right? And I wish this problem wasn't there. If this problem wasn't there, the absorption would have been higher from many of the developers, right? And developers like us who are -- who have a portfolio that is growing, the EC issue, some of the other approval delays are slowing the growth that we initially envisaged. But our hope is with some of the efforts underway by the CREDAI and NAREDCO et cetera, some of these issues will get resolved, and we should be able to get the launches back on track. A lot of GDV has been added by us and many other players, you'll see that come through in the next few months. The recent launches, I think, have been quite well received, even we've been tracking some of our peers have done good launches. But interestingly, the mix is shifted more towards premium even luxury. So that indicates there is a healthy price increase. But if you do like-for-like, I think the price increase is balanced compared to what we had seen in the past 2 to 3 years, where the price increase for like-to-like inventory was much higher. But now it's not like-to-like inventory. You will see much more of a mix shift that is happening. As we have more launches that come through, you'll be able to compare what the actual price increase is. They are specific market, I think there are 3 or 4 markets that we carefully track. MMR, Pune, have fewer launches. So in terms of the units launched, you'll see probably a flatness or degrowth. But in terms of pricing, they have done well. And again, the mix shift is I would remind on that. In terms of NCR and Bengaluru, they continue to witness both volume and pricing. The inventory overhang for the 4 markets that we carefully look at is between 9% to 16%. So overall healthy portfolio. It's -- anytime it crosses 24%, 28%, 30% is something that we need to worry about from a slowdown perspective. The right-hand side shows you how the market is changing. Last quarter when we shared this data, the affordable segment was 10% in terms of value. So volume was roughly 2%, less than 2%, but in terms of value, it is now significant. The affordable segment continues to grow. And the segment that we play, which is the middle segment, 65% mid-premium, premium continues to be quite a key part of the segment, and it's done well, not slowing down like affordable, not growing the way luxury has been. But I think we are glad to be participating in the segment, which is the largest. Talk about the raw material. I think last financial year, as you know, was a watershed year for us where we were able to add a lot GDV. We maintain a significant -- we have maintained momentum in this quarter 1. To our society redevelopment Lokhandwala 2. Actually, Lokhandwala 1 was acquired in quarter 4 of last financial year and the 2 more societies actually came to us, and they wanted to be part of the same cluster. So we've added that. Roughly this location, which is a very marquee location, our total -- that project, Lokhandwala 1 and 2 together would be somewhere around INR 2,300 crores to INR 2,500 crores. So pretty large project for us. Mulund is a new addition, a new location for us. It's close to Bhandup as a location. So we are going to be quite strong, hopefully dominant in that micro market. And then Navrat 2 is a location we had acquired Navrat 1 in quarter 4 of last financial year. Navrat 1 is equal size, roughly 9 acres of parcel. So 9 plus 8-odd, so roughly 16.5, 17 acres of Navrat 1 and 2, they are contiguous to each other. So it gives us a pretty very nice chunk of land just before very close to the airport, where -- which is a mark-to-market is very well established. So we wanted to pursue that this transaction has just happened. So going to be a very -- again, a very exciting project for us in Bangalore. We're going to combine them into one project, which allows us to get the efficiencies, one club house, one set of infrastructure, STP, et cetera. So that's how we have closed this deal, Navrat 2. We have a good pipeline. Again, we are looking at all the deals from a very rigorous financial point of view, expecting that the price increase will not continue the way we have seen and the cost escalations are going to be there given supply-demand dynamics and many other ratios. So that's the GDV edition. And I think we shared this slide with the changes in blue not capture. So it just allows us to increase the land bank, the GDV bank that we right now hold. So it is now up to INR 41,000 crores. We continue to look for good deals and INR 45,000 crores is not the end of our business development effort. It is just a marker. And as we get good deals, our focus is to make sure that these deals get converted into sales launches and sales at the earliest. So the work is -- it will be an ongoing work for us as we look at these deals, the deal addition momentum beyond what you see on this page. I think this was a question that was asked last what is our launch pipeline. So we wanted to capture the efforts that are underway. Obviously, INR 449 crores is a small number compared to what we want to achieve in the macro scheme of things. But if you see the launches that we have planned, where the effort is underway for approvals. Each one of them is under approval right now. So the design part, et cetera, is done many months back. So as a reference, Hopefarm is Alembic deal, which is roughly INR 2,000 crores. Bhandup phase 1 would be around INR 3,000 crores. Citadel Phase 3 is roughly INR 3,000 crores, Mahalaxmi is INR 1,700 crores. So if you total up all the things that we are planning to launch, I think this is in excess of INR 7,000 crores, 8,000 crores. We'll decide what phasing, what will be part of RERA depending on the micro market response we get. Like Bhandup may decide to do it in 2 phases, right? Similarly, we are discussing whether Hopefarm should be INR 2,000 crore, 1 phase or 2 phases. So we -- those things -- those decisions will take after we have done the initial set of approvals before the final RERA application. But the volume of inventory that will come online would be healthy for us -- sorry. And just to reiterate a point that I made earlier, selling is not a problem for us. GDV problem we have sold. Now we are trying to solve the launch problem. And I wish we didn't have the EC issue, which is holding up quite a bit of inventory in Mumbai. And in case of Bangalore, we actually delayed a little bit so that we could launch some of the bigger projects. Navrat 1 and 2, so we delayed Navrat 1 effort so that we can combine Navrat 1 and 2. Even Alembic, there was some issue with respect to road widening. So we said let's resolve that before we launch it rather than create issues later on. So we are taking the right call in terms of when to launch, how to launch and hopefully, some of the efforts that are underway in terms of approval, in terms of EC clearances, they will get resolved. So launch is not -- the sale is not a problem. And this is New Haven, Bengaluru was -- and I think 50% to 60% inventory was sold in 30 days. We could have sold 100%, but we wanted to balance velocity with profitability. And that's why we're holding back some inventory. This is next to Mahindra Zen. Mahindra Zen has the first 5-acre plot. This one is another 2.5, 3-acre plot and then there is one more plot that we are looking at nearby. So it becomes a nicer project. So Mahindra Zen did very well last year and so did New Haven. Marina 64. This is in Navy, our first redevelopment project that we have done. What we found is while we are doing a lot of redevelopment projects and winning them. While it's -- while they are capital efficient, they are time inefficient. What that means is you will not be -- we will not be able to launch those projects in 1 year. It will be 18 months to 24 months. Even if you take the cluster redevelopment policies, it will take 18 months to 24. We've learned a lot with Navy launches. In fact, Navy had 3 plots and we had to do three RERAs. Two RERAs have come the third RERA we're still waiting on, even though we have launched. So there is a 3x the effort that has gone in just for Navy, Marina 64. And these are some of the learnings that we have for future launches. And we have corrected some of our processes, some of the processes that are required for us to get approval, the capability required, the team required to make sure that we learned from these experiences and address them in future. Citadel Tower L, I think, a small inventory in terms of value, but response was very positive. Again, close to a sellout situation, right, Vimalendra. If you wanted to sell out everything, you could do that. This -- already you have sold 60%, 70%, right? Let me play a small video. Is there -- can you go ahead? [Presentation]

Great. So this is Marina 64. We have launched 2 plots so far. The third plot is RERA will need to wait for the EC resolution, I think. But by the way, this -- the person who was a presenter is actually one of our employees. So now we are developing our own influencers as employees within the company. So let me just cover this. So I showed this slide last time, and I think the 2 projects that we have added, Mulund and Navrat, when we did the meeting in April by the time Lokhandwala 2 had already been included. So we added Mulund and Navrat. So that's part of FY '28 plan, but our goal would be to actually accelerate as much as possible, but at least we are building up the gaps that existed at the time when we shared this with you. Many of you asked us, and we also have gotten feedback from some of the other meetings at the M&M level, is that why don't we give a short-term guidance. And I think we still have to get the approval machine going and solve this EC issue, 1 or 2, and we'll be able to give you a lot more guidance. But I think our -- as you see, the CAGR is 28%. So we are looking forward to having a growth of 25% to 30% every year. Some years, it will be higher, some quarters will be lower. But I think as we build, this is a very critical year for us. If we are able to deliver 28%, 30% actually higher number, it makes it easier for us to make sure that what we say is what we deliver. So I just want to hold that, but at least give you some kind of directional answer in terms of how we're thinking about the short-term. So it's not going to be, hey, we will not be able to achieve this, but some year it's going to be less, some year it's going to be more. That's why we have been a little bit shy of giving. But at least internally, we started to discuss why not we shoot between INR 4,500 crores to INR 5,000 crores in the next financial year, right? So not this financial year, but the next financial year. So we are at INR 2,804 crores in FY '25. So FY '27, can we actually get to INR 45 crores to maybe INR 5,000 crores, right? That's a good number for us to show momentum. And the raw material, as you see, is already existing with us. It's just a question of time passage where we are able to convert that. I think for us, IC business has been one of the biggest contributor in terms of profitability. This year also started very well. Q1 tends to be slow, but this year started very well. We have done a good amount of business both in Chennai as well as Jaipur. Obviously, we're running out of land in Chennai and OC2A, I'll show on the next slide is something that we are launching very soon. The last stages of approval are awaited. That's with Sumitomo. But as you can see, we are not -- at least we are getting good leasing. Leasing is actually perpetual sales in this case. We are getting good momentum. But the more important point I'm trying to -- I would like to highlight is, if you see the bottom data premium per acre, the -- there is a significant increase in the pricing. And that's something that is helping us increase the importance of IC business to our overall business portfolio. In fact, ever since Vikram has come in. We have got so many inquiries from different state government, different nodal agencies to partner with them to replicate and create another Mahindra World City, Chennai or Mahindra World City, Jaipur, where it's -- or even origin, which is just an integrated cluster, industrial cluster, not an integrated city. So there is a lot of demand. And we are carefully evaluating each of them. If there is a good revenue model and the revenue sharing model, then we would be very interested. As you know, in all of these locations, the land acquisition tends to be one of the most painful part. And that's where we want to make sure that when we sign up with another location with another government ideally or another partner, we have clarity on who -- how will the land acquisition process work and what would be the revenue sharing arrangement so that we actually help contribute to bottom line from this business. And this is like Jaipur is fully operational, is going -- is already contributing significantly Mahindra World City, Chennai has some amount of land left, which we are trying to sell out at the highest rate. Origins Chennai is practically done. There is one lawsuit going on that we'll try to resolve, settle in this financial year. Hopefully, that will give us additional land, which could come at a good pricing. And OC2A and 2B. 2A approval process is on. 2B will kick off very soon after we finish the land acquisition. So that is an area Origins Chennai 1 is already filled with a lot of global MNCs, many Japanese clients. Sumitomo is a partner. They have a strong business development effort going on in the home country, and that automatically brings us many clients. And similarly, OC2A, even though we don't have the approved, we already have MOUs and LOIs from 3 potential customers. So that's already is -- ready for action. Origins Ahmedabad is a location where we had -- there are issues in terms of the location attractiveness, but now we see a lot of inquiries coming. So we are putting dedicated effort on the business development side to ensure that, that site is ready for business at the earliest. And frankly, we were waiting for an anchor client, which can take at least 25 to 50 acres of land. But given the momentum that we are seeing in Gujarat, we feel soon enough Origins will be able to attract the first anchor client. Origins Pune is actually an ambitious plan. You've seen the first phase of our land aggregation target. But hopefully, it will be much bigger than that. The land aggregation is underway, and we'll hopefully be able to finish that effort at least for Phase I very soon. It will take at least 9 months, but at least we are pushing that 9 months to 12 months, but we are accelerating that. IC business, important seen is the final line that you see at the bottom, if you look at the overall land bank that we have, it can give us revenue of INR 5,000 crores to INR 6,000 crores, our share and similarly, PAT potential of INR 1,500 crores. Obviously, it will be spread across 8 to 10 years. But at least this has the ability to give us a good amount of profitability over the years. So that's a quick summary of the business. We'll cover more in our -- in Q&A. I'll hand over to Avinash for the financial part.

Thanks, Amit. Am I audible out there? Yes. So some of it is a repeat of what Amit talked about earlier. We saw residential sales or presales to be at very close to INR 450 crores, INR 449 crores to be precise. It shows that it is lower than last year, but you know this industry more than us where launches also determine a lot of what happens on the presales side. IC revenues, there's a handsome growth of about 16% over previous year same time period. INR 120 crores is what we got there. And Amit alluded to the INR 3,500 crores GDV addition, which is over and above what we have done to date. That takes us to about INR 41,000 crores of GDV cumulatively added over a period of time, very good land bank. Overall, collections have been very steady. If you look at close to about INR 500 crores of consistent collections that helps us from an overall perspective gives us good operating cash flow allows us to further invest more into land bank acquisition and things like that. You are aware of the rights issue that got concluded in the month of June. Our objective was twofold in order to raise the money, INR 1,500 crores was raised and about INR 1,000 crores is what was earmarked towards repayment of some of the existing debt. So I'm glad to say that as of today, we are pretty much long-term debt free. Having said that, the cash balance is much higher as compared to the gross debt. That allows us to have a net debt-to-equity ratio, which is negative. If you look at Q1 of FY '26, we are at minus 0.23. And basically, the cash is surplus. We are ready to deploy a little bit more into what we have planned for from an acquisitions perspective. Last but not the least, as Amit mentioned earlier, we have seen repo rate cuts and some of these things helping us even with whatever little debt that is left, we've been able to bear down the cost of debt as well. There are some commercial papers kind of opportunities, which we are exploring that gives us a very healthy -- they're coming at a very healthy interest rate. Our average cost has come down as compared to previous quarter. It is at about 8.12% now as compared to 8.6% that was earlier. There's a little bit more detail in terms of the segment performance. I've talked about this earlier, as to -- this is what we call as management accounts. How we do this is this is assuming the fact that while we have a lot of joint ventures and associates, assuming all of them were, say, our subsidiaries, we would have actually consolidated them line by line. IND AS typically allows us to only take the share of profits from JVs and associates. But if that were not the case because we are pretty much operating those entities on our own. So we break them into residential projects as well as IC. And if you look at what has come out there is that we are at residential plus IC total sales of about INR 569 crores as compared to INR 1,121 crores earlier. But as you come down, the EBITDA has actually gone up from INR 27 crores to INR 46 crores vis-a-vis last year -- first quarter of last year. And if I look at PAT, that is up from INR 13 crores. It's almost a 4x jump driven to some extent by the other income that we have, if you look at that line, that's gone up from INR 29 crores to [ INR 110 crores, ] mainly on account of some optimization on debt front that we've done in this particular quarter. So overall, a healthy beginning to the fiscal year. Last year, full year was a consolidated PAT of about INR 61 crores. This time, quarter 1 itself is about INR 51 crores. So that's the benchmark to look at. Interestingly, Amit talked about realization per acre. And if you look at the line, which talks about IC & IC. The area sold or the acres leased is very close to last year, 18.7%. But that has given INR 120 crores of income as compared to INR 103 crores of last year. So that is what is reflected in the lease rate per acre or premium per acre that we receive. So that is interesting to note. Well, this is how the P&L gets cast when we look at it from a consolidated perspective, but as per the IND AS method, well, this is in public domain now. The column to look at is Q1 FY '26. We started with operating revenues of INR 32 crores and then other income of INR 41 crores were added. And then as you go forward, you look at the share of net profit from JVs and associates. That's about INR 98 crores. So that is what is helping the overall bottom line to about INR 51 crores in Q1. And of course, like I said, much better than what we did Q1 of last year, which was INR 13 crores. The balance sheet shows a healthy trend. If we look at borrowings, it has basically come down over a period of time. We have been able to pare down the debt. The borrowings is reflected in both financial liabilities as well as borrowings at the top. The line that talks about financial liabilities is down from INR 918 crores to INR 214 crores, which is mainly a result of what happened on account of rights issue. The inventories and the reserves continue to be healthy. The cash position, as you see, is very strong, INR 238 crores has gone up to INR 747 crores, which is what I talked about earlier. That's why the net debt-to-equity ratio is negative. So overall, a healthy balance sheet and allows us to consolidate and grow further. That's It.

I will now request Amit, Vimalendra, Vikram and Avinash to take the stage to address any questions.

Whoever has a question raise your hand. Parikshit.

So my first question is on the launches. So this quarter, you have New Haven and Citadel. So just wanted to understand, out of the INR 449 crores of presales, so what is the contribution of these two launches?

Yes, New Haven would be roughly around INR 125 crores to INR 130 crores on this. Citadel Tower L was launched towards the end. So probably not reflected in the INR 449 crore number.

So almost INR 420 crores of sustained sales this quarter.

INR 320 crores.

INR 320 crores. Just on the launch pipeline now. So how has been the response to Marina project? And when do you think that you can launch the entire project, which is INR 1,000 crores GDV, so how is the split in Q2. So I understand that things you have launched it towards the end of the quarter, but it's not reflected in the presales. So how do you think the Q2 will pan out here and what inventory is getting opened? And also going into the other quarters, Q3 and Q4. So what is your plan for Alembic and Mahalaxmi, which are bigger launches? Do you think that you will now do single phase launches or again, split up because the business development has gone up significantly over the years now. So I think sizing-wise, how do you think now going ahead?

Do you want to answer Marina 64 and then we'll take.

So for Marina 64, as Amit mentioned, it's essentially a project with 3 different independent plots, essentially. So think of it like 3 different projects where 3 different RERAs. And we've already got RERA for plots C, for plot B anytime. Plot A, unfortunately, there's an industry-wide issue, which is related to EC, as you are aware, right? And a lot of the developments in Mumbai are unfortunately impacted by that. Hopefully, we'll -- we should get the resolution soon. The hearing is happening in the Supreme Court in a very fast way. But let me talk to you about Plot C because that's where we are collecting the EOIs. Effectively, we have more number of checks than the number of units. So in a very euphoric way or in a good way, I can tell you that it's completely sold out. But of course, it will get locked in the coming months and coming couple of months. So fabulous response. I think there's a lot of interest even for Plot A, which is stuck. But if I have to measure by the number of walk-ins at the site, and you should take this opportunity to visit the sales gallery on the weekend, it's chockablock. So we're very glad with the response we have received.

And on Alembic and Mahalaxmi.

I think that's a discussion we are having among ourselves. So I think our goal is to maximize profits, which will mean that we have to balance velocity. But there is a lot of momentum in the market right now. And we already have like the locations we have chosen, we already have people kind of reaching out saying that when are you launching? When are you launching, right? My sense is we'll go halfway. We'll not do like a full sellout -- we'll not do a typical 50% target. We'll go a little bit more. We'll get RERA for the most projects mostly. And we'll balance what we want to achieve, but the construction, et cetera, will be a full project at a time. So we will control -- we'll not target 50%. We'll not go all the way say, 100%, maybe 70%, so that we keep the remaining 30% for later years to sell.

But on the opening of the sales, like INR 2,000 crores Alembic. So do you think you can open it one shot? Or how are you thinking about that? Velocity, I understand it depends on what is open. But how are you thinking about sizing the project during the launch?

Yes. And that's exactly the discussion. You could have the same RERA. We can say, hey, we launched Phase 2, 3 months later or 6 months later, but that micro market should be able to absorb and that's the discussion we are going to finalize as we're doing the micro market assessment. So our goal would be to do more than what we have typically done, but let's make sure that it -- the market is able to absorb us.

On business development, in the past, we have seen that it has been more back ended the second half seems to be pretty strong. But here, like first quarter itself, we have like given what you used to do annually earlier. INR 3,500 crores to INR 4,000 crores. So for the rest of the year, how does the BD pipeline look like? And do you think that it's right now right to think that from here on, this number could now start looking or doubling up like close to about INR 10,000 crores plus on an annualized basis given that we have cash and a stronger balance sheet.

So I'll take that, Amit. So a very specific number we have never given, right? And in fact, when we did INR 18,100 crores last year, we spoke about it. We have already done INR 3,500 crores. As we speak, we have multiple transactions at different stages where we are evaluating. And obviously, before we take a call on any single opportunity, BD opportunity, the most important thing we internally discuss as a team is the financial discipline, the financial threshold. I mean, a particular location, micro market opportunity may be very attractive, but if it doesn't pass the internal test of financial threshold, we actually don't pursue it. But all I can tell you, Parikshit, is, I think we have -- and I take a lot of pride in saying because of the efforts of the last 2 years. We have effectively become a first port of call for various types of deals. So we are getting JDA deals, we are getting greenfield opportunities. We are getting a lot of interest in the society redevelopment space. So I think things are looking very exciting is what I'll tell you and very promising.

And just the last question on Kandivali now. We have just less than INR 1,000 crores to go about, and this is largely sustained. So how are you thinking about the next phase there from the parent? Are we into discussions or thought around how the next phase of monetization will start in that 90 acres plus of land?

You mean the Kandivali M&M land -- you have to ask them, I think. I think that's something we can't -- we are -- it's a different entity altogether. We'll obviously have the opportunity, but I don't think they have any plan that we know if we have, we'll certainly share.

Just one for Avinash, what has been the cash flow generation during this quarter? And how much have we invested in land during this quarter?

So our operating cash flow has been at about very close to INR 200 crores, say, INR 196 to be more precise. The overall land acquisitions is actually higher than that. It's almost INR 225-odd crores.

I think I just wanted to add, if I may, just to Parikshit it to your previous question to Vimalendra. I think we see a little bit of not necessarily consolidation, but a little bit of stress with some of the smaller developers. And as we are spending time in the market on the BD side, we are getting interesting deals where the guy who started the deal wants to get out and wants the next guy potentially us to actually step in. So you can call it consolidation, you can call it transfer, you can call it bailout. And we find while they may be slightly risky, they are financially very attractive from an IRR and ROI perspective. So the more astute you are in terms of your deal pipeline and looking at which micro market you want to participate and what kind of deal gives you the best combination of cash outflow and returns, that will determine which kind of deals we closed. If there are deals which are very good, there is no dearth of capital that will hold our appetite from going big and doing what we did with Bhandup. So I just want to highlight that the market dynamics are slightly changing, and we are very aware of how that market is changing and how we should adopt ourselves without any constraints on really on capital allocation, we'll find the capital to pursue right deals.

So I'm Biplab Debbarma from Antique Stockbroking. So my first question is on the approval challenges. I mean last year also in the first half, we heard a lot of approval challenges in Bangalore. Now not only you, other developers, Mumbai based are also saying approval challenges related to some NGT and eco sensitive. So I'm just trying to understand in terms of approval challenges, what exactly is this challenge you have gone to Supreme Court? What is -- on what basis we -- against you guys who were there on the other side? Is it the government or is it NGT or whoever? And what are the key challenges in terms of approval. Is it the only challenge the approval challenge you have or other challenges also?

So let me break this and I'll request Vimalendra to jump in. I think there are the usual challenges, right, which are Khata issue or some local issues into the road width, et cetera. Those are, I would call it business as usual. It delays things but doesn't stop right? But let's take the EC issue or NGT issue. I like Vimalendra to chime in. But that is -- doesn't happen -- it's not part of business as usual, and it's not affected us. It's affected the whole all the participants in Mumbai significantly. So I'll request Vimalendra to jump in there.

Yes. So I'll just explain this particular issue in very brief because it's quite a large case which is going on. But essentially, what is happening is there was a notification from NGT National Green Tribunal, right? And related to a different case altogether, not pertaining to real estate, but it was related to mining. But then they came with a very generic circular because of the generic secular everything was put on hold. Then CREDAI actually, which is a representative body for real estate developers. They actually went to the Supreme Court saying that, hey, you cannot just put a general stop. So because of that stop what happened is the projects which need to be assessed for EC environmental clearance were neither done at a state level nor they are being done at a central level. There are only 2 people who were 2 bodies who can do it either the central government does it or the state government does it. Now the circular was such that -- I mean neither the state was able to take it nor the center was able to take it. So essentially, a nutshell, in a very simple way. We are -- as a body, we have told Supreme Court either allow center to do it or allow state to do it. I think that is the issue, and that is where we are. Hopefully, hopefully, should get resolved. I think the hearing is going on as we speak. And it has impacted in a big way most of the developments in Mumbai, right? So it's not as if it's Mahindra Lifespace alone. It's pretty much every single developer, which has got impacted because of Sanjay Gandhi National Park, which is defined as an ecologically sensitive zone, that's a problem which we are fairly confident because there's no other way but to resolve this. So it should happen, but it's taken a little bit of a time. But yes.

So I understand this is only restricted to Mumbai. And it is not -- the decision is to be who will take that decision.

Yes. First technical point, I think what Vimalendra said is very important. It used to be 100 meters from a ecologically sensitive zone. So you can do construction 100 meters away. Now that NGT Bhopal given order it's 5 kilometer. So from NGT, which is like in the suburb, it's a big -- if you take 5 kilometers, most of the Bombay will -- so there are 70,000 units are stuck either before not being launched or construction is not happening. It's not only the launch, it's also affecting the construction and the player to the -- beyond allowing somebody to do it is to say, "Hey, revert to what it was before because for Mumbai, it doesn't -- it's just not possible for us to do it.

So this 5-kilometer is a new thing.

Yes, earlier project falls into the - right in the 5-kilometer.

So what happened just again, Sanjay Gandhi National Park is very unique to Mumbai. It's essentially an urban forest. They kept in mind the normal national parks and other things where they said 5 kilometers from the national park boundaries, you can't do it. But unfortunately, 5 kilometers of Mumbai is pretty much the entire Mumbai gets over on either side. So that's a problem.

That's good. And the second thing is on the projects that you're currently doing, and you're going to do, what kind of project level EBITDA margin do you think you can achieve in these projects?

The EBITDA margin is at Q1. I think, Avinash, you can jump in because this is a business where P&L doesn't tell the story. The way we now changed our mind in the last 2 years, 18 months is look at IRRs of the project, right, and load all the overheads into the project, right? Some part is inventorized and some part is corporate overhead, you actually move it above the line. So that you are generating enough cash to actually fund all your overheads. EBITDA is to capture, right, the overheads, right, to say how much EBITDA from the project and then the overheads come in, right? So I think the IRRs that we are shooting is now 20% plus from each project. And with the cost escalation with inventorization as well as the overheads being loaded on to them. And that typically is a healthy way to do the accounting or at least the financial analysis for those projects?

The question where I'm coming from is, I see a lot of redevelopment projects that you have. My understanding is that initial investment in those projects is negligible. And you will sell -- so it's like without putting much money you get good IRR. But at the end of the day, how big, what kind of value it can create. That's why I was asking about that.

No. But what happens is you are constructing typically, so let's say, in a 100 -- let's say you have $100 revenue project, 1/3 is land, 1/3 is cost of construction, 15-let's say, sales, marketing, overhead should be, let's say, 10%, 15%. So 20% is your margin, right? That's where it typically is. Society redevelopment, there is no land cost per se. But your cost of construction because you're constructing typically twice the volume is 65%. 35% for the sale tower and 30%, 35% for the residents, right? Resident and you give them rent, you give them corpus, et cetera. So the land cost gets replaced by additional square foot that you have to construct. The economics works out, absolutely. This industry is so well received. Everybody is back-calculated the numbers, how much they will allow the developers to make and then that we expect the construction additional area to be awarded. So it's very similar. So -- but you're right, in case of society redevelopment, you don't have to put money upfront. So you don't put that INR 200 crores that we put for Navrat 2, it's 0 for Mulund practically a little bit. But then during the construction, I have to spend double the money. So the IRR works out to be similar because the cash inflows are only one source of it. We can spend more time walking you through some of the details, if need be.

This is Udit from Yes Securities. Sir, just if you can throw some highlight in terms of the pricing that you are seeing for each of your projects? Or how do you see the MMR overall pricing moving from here on?

Okay. So I'll talk about Mahindra Lifespaces prices first. Let me give you a very specific example about Malad, right. It was code name 64 that we have launched. We have positioned it as premium to the market. Very clearly, we are -- we have a significant price advantage over any other deployment, which is there. So that's one. As Amit mentioned, the pricing growth actually in MMR is quite healthy still. And I think the demand still remains robust. It's just that the launches have been lower. So the volumes have been lower because of reasons beyond the control of a developer. But what we are seeing is, again, the demand is very robust. The pricing growth continues to be very robust. And as far as we are concerned as a company, we are clearly able to now get a certain amount of premium in the micro market where we are operating. So all in all, a good picture.

Even in the project that we had launched, which is Vista, we did experience a healthy price growth, almost over 12% to 13% over what we had lost. So like you said, pricing growth has been healthy quarter-over-quarter has been pretty.

Are you looking at specific numbers or what?

Generic was fine, sir.

But if you buy from us, we'll give you exact pricing.

Akash from Nomura. So I just wanted to understand on your capital deployment strategy. So we have roughly INR 41,000 crores of project, and then we are just launching INR 6,000 cores to INR 7,000 crores. So ideally other developers, whatever they do business development, they launch in the next 12 months. So I just wanted to understand how your capital allocation strategy is working because a lot of this capital may be in these projects. So how does the IRR work there?

Yes. No, it's a great question. And I think let me just explain that INR 41,000 crores. So of the INR 41,000 crores, let's say, INR 200-odd crores plus/minus is between 2 projects. One is Bhandup, the other is Thane, right? Now -- and then the next, I would say, roughly INR 10,000 crores to INR 12,000 crores would be in society redevelopment, Lokhandwala, this and that. So you're talking INR 32,000 crores roughly. And then I would say another INR 3,000 crores is in Rajasthan and Murud, which are longer in mid- to long-term, it will take time for us to get approval. A lot of things are needed. So of the INR 41,000 roughly INR 35,000 crores is mid- to long-term. That's where you see a big difference between what you see as a huge pipeline. That means our midterm is very secure, right? Midterm, long-term is very secure, right? Because society redevelopment, you just can't launch it in the next 12 months, right? And that's why some of the other developers, there's a poll by there. Some love it and some hate it, right, because of this nature. It's time inefficient, capital-efficient. And depending on your brand pool and et cetera, you're able to manage through that. But let's talk about Bhandup and Thane. Even if I wanted to launch INR 12,000 crores, it will not sell because that market micro market cannot absorb INR 12,000 crores of inventory in one. Typically, it's INR 4,000 crores to INR 5,000 crores market, even if I do INR 1,000, INR 1,500 crores, it will take me 8 to 10 years to leverage or to sell all of Bhandup. Similarly, Thane, it's end of the Ghodbunder Road, INR 8,000 crores. The price point is INR 15,000, INR 16,000, INR 17,000, even if I can sell more, I don't want to sell more because there is a metro station that's coming up. There is the tunnel work going on. It will likely be done in the next 12 in a meaningful way. The pricing will go from 15,000 to, let's say, 20,000 because the other end of Ghodbunder Road is INR 25,000 crores to INR 30,000 crores. So I have a natural preference to delay my first launch to slightly later because land is ours. It's there. We'll get all the approvals till I have to make the first payment so that I can maximize my PAT and IRR. So this is like the INR 35,000 crores worth of inventory, the INR 6,000 crores you will be seeing them launched. Alembic is that, Navrat is that. Anything that's outright, you'll see those launches come up in 12 months. So we have a similar timeline in our mind. And in fact, when we have done some deals, especially in Pune and all, we're looking for land with approvals. So the approvals with the land owner, et cetera. So we're able to launch them within 6 months. But we are creating the portfolio. This is the first time we've created such a big portfolio. The short-term will have a little bit of a lead time, but I think in the next 12 months, you'll see a very different set of projects which are giving us sustenance sale every year, and then we are topping it up with the new launches.

Maybe we'll take one question on the online portal.

Yes, sure.

So the question is, could you provide an update on execution timelines and sales traction for the upcoming projects in Mumbai and Pune. Vimalendra?

Yes. So let me start with the sales traction. And I think it comes to even Parikshit, you asked about Pune also Citadel. So we actually launched one -- we only had this one BHK tower there, kind of a very premium positioning and happy to share that we have sold in last 3 days, more than 70% of the units that we had launched in that particular tower. So again, what we have seen pricing significantly higher than the micro market. And without getting into the name, because of our pricing, the micro market pricing also moved up so some of the other developers actually increased the prices of their inventory. So I think it's going on well there. In terms of execution of the projects, again, there's a very strong internal discipline that we have in terms of every single phase, every single stage and we spoke about IRR quite a lot. So in that particular process, we track every single project through internal reviews every month in a very, very detailed way, right, where we are what are the challenges, the contractor issues, if there are any, the procurement strategies, anything and everything, right, is very comprehensive. So as we speak today, I think we are very much tracking every single project to the timelines as per the RERA commitment. Obviously, that's the gold standard. So we are good. We don't see any challenges as far as the execution on the ground is concerned on the projects.

This is Rishabh from Axis Capital. So 2 related questions actually. On the redevelopment side, in terms of bidding, how competitive is the space and if it's getting more competitive, what is giving us the right to win? And secondly, how are the timelines from maybe, say, getting an LOI to launch?

Okay. So the space is fairly competitive, in a sense, as Amit said, everybody is quite informed. So even when a society actually typically goes for a tender process, which is a public tendering, they precisely they appoint a project management consultant, what we call as a PMC, right? He does a lot of back-ended calculations. They actually know what are the kind of concessions you'll be able to get, what kind of fungible premiums you'll be able to get, what is the price available in the market. Typically, there will be some contractors or other people staying there. So they know what is the cost of construction. So I think it's a very informed set of people driven by or supported by professionals. So it is competitive. It is competitive. But I think what we have seen clearly over the last 2 years that we have got into redevelopment space, there is clear preference for branded corporate developers. So what you will see a lot of the smaller players who are not really, say, the corporate or don't have a strong -- the financial capability, balance sheet, are the people who don't even get shortlisted. So quite essentially, you will see it's only those 8, 9 names which will pretty much bid in every single project. And even there, in terms of the final shortlisting, it will be the top tier because obviously, redevelopment, nobody really wants to take a chance. And many of the societies have burned their hands in the past where redevelopments have been stuck for, what, 10 years after the LOI is done. After that 79A process is complete, but no movement. So clearly, a competitive space, but I think a clear bias for players like Mahindra Lifespaces given that what we stand for very strong sense of trust, very strong governance framework, transparency. I think we have -- if I can very proudly say that we have emerged as a developer of choice for a lot of the redevelopment societies given that what as a brand we stand for. So -- but yes, if the financials again don't work out, we said we are not really -- if there is no compelling financial reason, we don't pursue the redevelopment opportunity. So that is cast in stone here. It has to make financial sense for us.

Well, I'll add 2 things. I think time wise, the question was LOI to award and to launch. I think they are typically 6 months, right, Vimalendra? From the first time there's an interest shown, there is a PMC involved. It takes 6 months. And then from the time you win, you won that to the launch. Our experience has taken 2 years, but now we are targeting 18 months. But having a number of residents drives the complexity of the deal or the launch effort. And in this case, you have to demolish the building for you to get RERA. So it's a little bit more stringent from that point. So it takes 2 years, but we are targeting 18 months from that point of view. And also, as Vimalendra said, there is also -- there are many places we walked away from deals if there is quid pro quo expectations or any kind of favoritism that we need to show and we walk away even after winning. So we have done that. So that's another thing we keep in mind as we participate in this sector.

Probably we'll take one more question online. This is for you, Amit, and Vimalendra. We nearly have about INR 32,000 crores of GDV to launch in future. And we are currently at INR 2,800 crores heading to INR 10,000 crores in 5 years. So what's our focus going to be more on execution or aggressively pursuing BD? And how should we look at it?

We covered the plan, actually, the details of it. I think our goal is to create a company which is relevant, is doing good work in the space, creating amazing homes for our customers and in return, rewarding the shareholders very simple. And I think each year is a year of discovery for the next phase of the journey. Last year was for us to change the direction, the trajectory with adding a lot of GDV. I think we don't need to do another INR 18,000 crores, INR 20,000 crores this year. But if good deals come, we will not be shy of doing more. We will do a healthy GDV that makes financial sense. And I think that disciplined process will continue for us. As long as the IRR, the returns are attractive, we will look at those deals, right? The execution, I think there are 3 parts of execution can we launch it, can we construct it and can we deliver it, right? Those 3 parts. I think our focus on construction and delivery is already there. That's point Vimalendra mentioned, a lot of very stringent. We have roughly INR 16,000 crores worth of projects under construction. So they're all going through a very rigorous execution. You next time, we'll have our Head of projects also join the meeting. But that's something that we are really doing. Now the question is how do we convert the GDV into launches. And I think that's where if you have a bigger portfolio and then you have one EC issue or NGT issue I think Parikshit, you were mentioning another developer example, it's 10%, 20%, 30%. For us, it's right now 50%, 60%, right, which is affecting us. In 2 years, that will also become less than 25%, an issue, which is not a business as usual. And that's easier for us to manage. So our goal is to create a healthy business, healthy portfolio project. And I think we will -- we are prioritizing this year launches, hoping the NGT and EC issue gets resolved. But after that, there's not going to be any slowdown at least in the business-as-usual scenario. Project focus continues. I think that's bread and butter for us, and that will always be there.

Parikshit. So on the industrial line business. So how do you see the momentum there? I mean 18 acres we have sold leased this quarter. But how do you see the demand there? And given the slowdown which we are seeing currently in the economy, how is the leasing market and the manufacturing side of it playing out on the ground? So your deal pipeline inquiries or how they're building up?

Thanks. But we're not seeing any decline in the inquiries. I think inquiries are very, very good and they're healthy and they're building up. You have to look at maybe a few factors, right? One is in India, the overall consumption comes from the domestic consumption, which is very, very high. It's always aided by a lot of geopolitics, which is happening, which is only positive in nature for us is what I believe. Second, you have to look at -- when we showed -- when Amit showed the presentation, it only looked at the projects we have presently with us and the land inventory which we have, which is just waiting for approvals. And I think Amit mentioned that for us, the challenge is not demand, the challenge is, how sooner we get the land to be able to sort of monetize in terms of approvals and aggregation in Pune and couple of locations. What we also not capture, like Amit mentioned, was that we are also being approached by various state governments and other bodies who are saying that we want to work with you, right? So that's another sort of potential positive upside which is available there. So just to answer your question, the pipeline is fairly healthy and fairly confident in terms of what we need to deliver this year.

And on the Sumitomo transaction, I mean, the understanding that you will expand with them and get them Japan MNCs into India. So is there any separate pathway choosing towards business development on the IC business side? Or like it will happen in the expansion in the existing Origins. And are you looking at beyond that and developing new industrial parks?

Let me take that. But either way, I'm glad you asked Vikram a question. He was feeling left out. So I think with Sumitomo, it's a very deep relationship. And Vikram and I were there in Japan 2 weeks back, meeting their leadership team. I think there are 2 potential areas of growth as we are seeing. First is where we already have the land. So -- or we are jointly pursuing land aggregation. So Origins Chennai 1 is where we started, Origins Chennai 2a, where we signed in November. Origins 2B, we have already signed an MOU, so they will expand with us. They're also looking at our other parcels of land in Pune and Ahmedabad for potential partnership there. And we'll find out when and how the shape of that partnership is finalized. It depends on the aggregation, it depends on the -- it depends on the like the approval, et cetera. So all that is undergoing. So they will come with us on our existing land assets. That's the first partnership. Second is we are jointly discussing other opportunities. And Chennai, Tamil Nadu is something we have seen tremendous results. So we had the opportunity -- they actually had the opportunity to host the Tamil Nadu Industry Minister last week or a week before. I also joined remotely and we discussed a range of areas of cooperation based on Sumitomo's interest and Mahindra's interest. And we said, are there bigger land parcels that Tamil Nadu can offer to us, where we can Sumitomo jointly pursue them. Similarly, there are opportunities being offered to us in other states that Vikram touched upon. So there is how do we participate where we already have land that is already underway and that will only expand. We're also looking at other opportunities where Sumitomo and us can actually jointly pursue other opportunities, new novel opportunities. And that is also with NICDC, if you know, it's with some of the other PSUs, opportunity specific to a rare earth magnet. There are very specific area, but too early for us to be talking about them. But if they take it forward, we'll be happy to share more details.

Just the last question on the NCR market. I know last time you said that there's still some time away. We have withdrawn from that market. But given that the strength still is very strong, underlying strength is strong. And especially on the Noida side, where you can get good land parcels on auction. So any thought, I mean, how in distant future you are looking at, again, to start off with a pilot project there and then look at ramping up over the years?

I think let's take this year to make sure that we strengthen ourselves. We evaluate the decision next year potentially. And I think my sense is you would -- it's -- NCR is my home market. That's where I used to live. I know that market well, lived there 15 years. I'd love to have operation there. But I also feel from a business perspective, going deep in any market is much more valuable than broad. But at the right time, we will look at that. And I think we have seen the successes of some of our peers. There are not many credible developers that are in NCR. There are very few and if we go there, we'll hopefully be able to get good attention from our customers. But let's strengthen ourselves here before we jump to another market.

Thanks, everyone. There are no questions, we'll conclude the meeting.

I had a question for the -- I think we tried to do this last time physical, and this 1 is also physical. Is the right frequency quarterly? Should we do 1 every 6 months. Any thoughts on the colleagues here.

So half yearly should be fine because, yes. Because things do take time for change quarter-to-quarter, it doesn't change much, so.

Any other thoughts? We love to meet, but I think -- but we'll go ahead.

Half yearly or whenever, I mean, some interaction -- physical interaction is desirable you have other things to do but...

No, no, we think should we do every quarter or should we do H1, H2.

Every quarter, I think, as you rightly pointed out, maybe a little bit for you all for once in a while is good, half yearly is excellent.

Okay. Okay. Got it.

I really enjoyed it.

Thank you. We also enjoyed. With that, we can conclude, right?

Yes, we can conclude.

Thank you.