BEL eyes more civilian ventures to sustain growth

State-run Bharat Electronics Limited (BEL), which mostly makes electronic goods for the Indian defence forces, is planning to venture deeper into the civil aviation, healthcare and transport arenas in a bid to sustain its growth amid rising competition.

BEL, which recorded 88% of its sales from the defence business in the last financial year, is looking to clock sales of at least 20% from its non-defence ventures going forward.

“If we are to aim for sustainable growth, we need to venture into other sectors as well and maintain an 80%-20% ratio of defence and non-defence business,” BEL Chairman and Managing Director Anandi Ramalingam said on Wednesday.

The company’s success in making ventilators during the pandemic had urged it to take up more projects in the healthcare sector, BEL Chief Financial Officer Dinesh Kumar Batra explained.

“Based on this success, we want to venture into other areas and are looking at manufacturing oxygen concentrators and dialysis units. In fact, we are working closely with a Bengaluru-based startup to design an affordable dialysis unit. Now, we also have a dedicated medical electronics wing,” Batra said.

BEL, which is already running civil aviation-based projects, has also collaborated with the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation. It clocked a record turnover of Rs 15,044 crore for the financial year that ended in March 2022, marking the first time it crossed the Rs 15,000 crore turnover mark.

It was a peculiar year for them, Batra added. "We had the ability to record at least another Rs 2,200 crore turnover. But, the Covid-induced lockdown followed by a semiconductor shortage cut our speeds.”