JOIN USReliance Infrastructure today reported a 43.72 per cent increase in consolidated net profit for the March quarter at Rs 659.85 crore on the back of improvement in operations.
The company had reported a net profit of Rs 459.11 crore in the January-March period last fiscal.
Its consolidated net income from operations for the quarter declined marginally to Rs 4,469.28 crore from Rs 4,596.09 crore.
"The increase in profit is a reflection of improvement in operations. It also reflects some one-time jump through EPC billing, the cost of which was incurred earlier," the company's Acting Chief Executive Officer Lalit Jalan told reporters here.
For the full fiscal, the company reported a net profit of Rs 1,974.56 crore and a total revenue of Rs 17,051.2 crore against Rs 1,800.18 crore and Rs 17,159.49 crore respectively in 2014-15.
During the year, it acquired management control of Reliance Defence and Engineering, the erstwhile Pipavav Defence and Offshore Engineering.
"We have also signed final binding agreement with Birla Corporation for sale of our 5.6 MTPA cement assets. Our asset monetisation plan of roads and Mumbai power business is also on track," he said.
Jalan further said the company expects all the three transactions to be completed in 2016-17 itself.
"We have shortlisted two consortia for the roads projects and the cement business deal is expected to be completed between July-August period. With these three transactions, we believe we will be able to bring down our debt significantly and on the standalone basis, we will be debt free in this fiscal itself," he added.
On consolidated basis, the debt of the company stands at around Rs 25,500 crore, while the standalone debt is around Rs 15,000 crore.
Reliance Infra has signed a non-binding term sheet with PSP Investments of Canada for 49 per cent stake sale in Mumbai power business.
On the Mumbai power distribution business, he said the company recovered Rs 866 crore arrears in 2015-16 and till date recovered Rs 2,248 crore. It added 64,800 new consumers in 2015-16, taking the total number to 29.5 lakh.
He said the government has also allotted land at Mihan (Nagpur) in Maharashtra to manufacture aerospace equipment and naval combat systems. The company has also received 35 industrial licences for missiles, ammunition, land and naval systems.
"Our focus will be on air defence systems, including missiles and large aerostats through joint venture with Rafael Advanced Systems Ltd (Israel), which has an opportunity worth USD 10 billion over next 10 years.
"Besides, we will also focus on aircraft manufacturing through partnership agreement with Antonov (Ukraine) for military and civil use, an opportunity worth USD 5 billion over next 10 years," Jalan said.
The company is also looking at tapping large scale ammunition market globally and in India, which has an opportunity of over USD 10 billion over next 10 years, he said.
"We have already bid for projects worth Rs 84,000 crore in the defence space," he added.
During the year, the company's total order book stood at Rs 3,075 crore, while its revenues stood at Rs 2,774 crore.
It earned a revenue of Rs 675 crore from its infrastructure business, while Rs 217 crore from the Mumbai metro segment.
The cement business earned revenue of Rs 1,464 crore from 5.6 MTPA operational capacity in 2015-16.