Balmer Lawrie & Co Ltd, which witnessed a marginal decline (around one per cent) in turnover in FY21, is expecting growth this fiscal backed by good demand in industrial packaging, greases and lubricants, logistics infrastructure and cold chain segments.

The company is eyeing a 10-11 per cent growth and is hopeful of clocking a turnover of around ₹1,770 crore during the current fiscal as compared to ₹1,593 crore in FY21.

According to Adika Ratna Sekhar, Chairman and Managing Director, Balmer Lawrie, the company aims to achieve a turnover of close to ₹6,000 crore by FY25. The company is looking to enter into integrated logistics park, plastics business and industrial packaging.

“Our strategic plan talks about an integrated logistics park and also about getting into plastics and IP area... right now, we are scouting for a good location. Then we will have to look at the return on investment and payback period. Once that is done, we will take the proposal to the board. Right now, there is nothing in this area but may be in the next three years,” Sekhar said at a virtual press conference post the company’s annual general meeting here on Tuesday.

The company’s foray into integrated logistics park, plastics business and IP sector would require a ₹1,000 crore capex. Of this, ₹500 crore would come from internal accruals and another ₹500 crore from market borrowings.

Cold chain infrastructure

The company had ventured into the cold chain space and has set up Temperature Controlled Warehouses (TCWs) at Rai, Hyderabad and Patalganga (Navi Mumbai).

It also has a TCW at the multi-modal logistics hub at Visakhapatnam with total pallet position of 15,000. Its TCWs are supported by its own fleet of Temperature Controlled Vehicles (TCVs) to ensure an end-to-end solution.

The company has already invested close to ₹40 crore in setting up the infrastructure and has earmarked ₹43 crore during the current fiscal. It is setting up a new TCW at Bhubaneswar which is expected to be commissioned by the end of this year.

It is further planning to expand its footprints in the warehousing and distribution industry by setting up an additional warehousing facility at Kolkata during FY22. It has also planned the modernisation of the industrial packaging plant at Chittoor.

“The cold chain business is emerging as a potential growth area for the company and therefore to ensure adequate focus, this vertical will be operated as an independent SBU termed as Logicold-Cold Chain Solutions. India being an agro-based country and with government schemes giving a thrust to this segment, cold chain is looked upon as the sunrise sector of India. With an increase in demand of dairy, fruits, vegetable and pharma products in both the domestic and international markets, our cold chain business has been rightly aligned to serve these segments,” he said.

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