Titagarh Wagons has an order book of Rs5,000 crore: JP Chowdhary, Executive Chairman

JP Chowdhary, Executive Chairman, Titagarh Wagons, talks about the international business and impact of coronavirus, order pipeline and defence business among others during an interview with Swati Khandelwal, Zee Business. Edited Excerpts: 

Q: What is your outlook on international business amid geopolitical tensions and the outbreak of coronavirus?

A: We can't feel any direct impact of Coronavirus on our business as we have heavy engineering units. But, definitely, if the global business and economy are going to have a downturn then it will have some impact, however, any immediate impact hasn't been seen. At the same time, we hope and pray that this virus issue gets settled more quickly than later. 

Q: What is your current order book and how much is the order pipeline for Q4FY20?

A: We have an order book, globally, of Rs5,000 crore of which we have an order book of around Rs2,400 crore in Italy and rest Rs2,600 crore comes from the Indian operations. It is a reasonably good order book and we would like to make it more healthy and that's we are trying for the same. That's why we expect that the order book will improve a bit in the coming months.

Q: How is your defence business order pipeline as you are building warships for the Indian Navy in West Bengal? Also, tells us about the steps that you are taking to increase the order book?

A: We are concentrating on metro rail segment to increase our order book and have achieved some success and are participating in a number of metros, which are coming up in the country. At the same time, there are talks related to fast trains and we have the technology of making fast trains with speed around 300 km/hour. When it comes to ships than it is not so that we have received the orders for warships but in view of our good performance, which has been quite good as we got orders of four ships and they were delivered within time. Interestingly, the customer was very satisfied in terms of quality and that's why we have been approved for warship design and we are looking for orders in that and hopefully will get the orders related to it. So, the future appears to be bright in terms of the order book.

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Q: What is your CapEx plan for FY21?

A: We don't have any big Capital Expenditure (CapEx) plans as we have got enough hardware, factory, and space. We would like to make optimum utilisation of that space. But, still, as you go into the sophisticated products then some or other CapEx requirements are needed.