Antony Waste Handling Cell Ltd (NSE: AWHCL) Q1 2026 Earnings Call dated Aug. 11, 2025
Corporate Participants:
Unidentified Speaker
N G Subramanian — Group Chief Financial Officer
Analysts:
Unidentified Participant
Gaurav Gandhi — Analyst
Bhavya Gandhi — Analyst
Neerav Dalal — Analyst
Faisal Hawa — Analyst
Presentation:
operator
Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to Anthony Waste Handling Cell Limited Q1FY26 earnings conference call. This conference may contain forward looking statements about the company which are based on beliefs, opinions and expectations of the company as on the date of this call. These statements are not the guarantees of future performance and involve risk and uncertainties that are difficult to predict. As a reminder, all participant line will be in the listen only mode and there will be an opportunity for you to ask questions after the presentation concludes. Should you need assistance during this conference call, please signal an operator by pressing Star then zero on your touchstone phone.
Please note that this conference has been recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Subramaniamenji Group CFO from Anthony Waste Handling Cell Ltd. Thank you. And over to you, sir.
N G Subramanian — Group Chief Financial Officer
Thank you. Good afternoon everyone and thank you for joining us on our Q1 FY26 earnings conference call. I have with me SGA our investor relations advisors, our investor presentations for the first quarter. FY26 is available on the stock exchanges and on our company’s website. For the first quarter of financial year 2026, the company had a strong start the reaching peak operational and financial performance across all verticals. This performance reflects the resilience of our business model and the efficiency of our operations and our unwavering focus on sustainable growth. During the quarter, our collection and transportation operations efficiently handled approximately 0.52 million tonnes of waste while at our processing facilities we handle around 0.81 million tons of Munster solid waste, reflecting a year on year growth of 10% and 13% respectively.
Overall total tonnage for the first quarter. FY26 reached about 1.33 million tonnes, marking a 13% increase compared to the previous year. Same quarter, our waste to energy plant delivered a strong performance as always operating at a healthy PLF of about 84%. This not only surpassed our expectation, but also set new industry benchmarks for a project which is up for more than a year and a half, underscoring our capability to consistently convert waste into clean energy. In Q1 FY26, our PCMC WTE generated over 25 million green units, underscoring our commitment to reducing fossil fuel dependency and cutting carbon emissions. These efforts resulted in the avoidance of approximately 3,432 tons of CO2 emissions, further demonstrating our focus on sustainability and responsible environmental stewardship.
I would like to highlight the commercial launch of our Extended Producer Responsibility Initiative in the WTE division. With the PCMC WTE project registered to qualify for EPR credits, we have monetized. 20% of the first year allocation of. Over 94,400 metric tons. This achievement positions us at the forefront. Of India’s circular economy transition, seamlessly integrating environmental responsibility. Furthermore, our construction and demolition waste recycling site continue to operate smoothly, setting a new industry benchmark with an impressive 96% recycling rate. This achievement not only showcases our capability to convert waste into valuable resources, but also strengthens our confidence in successfully entering. And operating new businesses, further advancing our circular economy goals. Resource recovery emerged as a key highlight this quarter with a segment recording its highest ever sales. Compost sales stood at approximately 6,600 tonnes. Up 10% yoy, while refuse derailed. Fuel sales surged by an impressive 62%. To around 55,500 tons. These achievements reflect our steadfast progress in advancing circularity, reducing reliance on landfills and fostering a cleaner and cleaner environment. On The ESG front, Scoop 1 and. Scope 2 emissions for the year were. Approximately 6,616 tonnes and 564 tons of CO2 emissions respectively, while awarded emissions stood at about 3,432 tonnes. As I mentioned earlier, our ground staff strength totaled around 10,300 plus, underscoring our continued investment in a skilled workforce to. Drive operational excellence and advance our sustainability goals. A Point on the Legal Aspect by its order dated 1st of August 2025. The Supreme Court has staged the Bombay High Court’s judgment of May 2, 2025 in the PIL number 20 of 2013. This stay maintains the status quo at. The Kanjumarg landfill, allowing landfill operations to. Continue and safeguarding the concessionaires. That is Anthony Lara, which is a. Significant subsidiary of the company’s rights under the concession agreement, including the right to. Seek compensation for losses arising from any. Premature halt in operations. The special leave petitions against the High Court’s decision filed by our subsidiary, the Municipal Corporation of Greater Mumbai and the State of Maharashtra challenged the quashing of the 2009 denotification of about 120 hectares at Kanjurmar and the reach statement of its protected forest status under the Forest Conservancy Act 1980. The High Court held the notification ultravios ordered the restoration of the forest. Given the Supreme Court stay, we believe. Long term revenue visibility under the contract remains strong. Together with the company’s liquidity and strong net asset base. We remain very robust to handle the. Waste of the City of Mumbai. Now coming to the financial performance, our operating revenue increased by 13% reaching around. 224 crores in Q1FY26 compared to the same period last year. In Q1FY26 we observed a notable shift in our revenue composition. MSW CNT contributed 60%, processing accounted for 28% and contracts and others comprised the remaining 12%. This marks a change from Q1FY25 where the respective contributions were 59%, 26% and 15% respectively. Our diversified revenue streams continue to offer. Strategic flexibility and position the company for sustained long term growth. Our focus to concentrate more on processing. Segment has yielded these results. In Q1 26 our CND witnessed a strong growth in revenue reaching 151 crores registering a growth of 11% on a YoY basis. At the processing division we showed a. Growth of 17% with the revenue reaching 72 crores. This growth was driven by steady power. Sales from the PCMC WT ramp up of our Citco biominning project and revenue from a CND waste processing entity. These results highlight our integrated waste management strategy blending operational excellence with strategic infrastructure investments which are now started delivering consistent returns. The group reported an EBITDA of 62 crores for the quarter representing a robust 12% YoY growth with margins at 24% in line with the company’s expectation. The PAT for The quarter was 23. Crores which is a growth of 8% as compared to Q1 FY25. As of June 2025, the group’s gross debt stood at approximately 448 crores. Cash and bank balances of around 87 crores results in a net debt of approximately 361 crores. This indicates a net debt to equity ratio of 0.4x. The group’s weighted cost of debt is approximately 9.2% and our sales outstanding remain stable which ended at the quarter at 114. Our robust track record coupled with trust that municipalities place us backed by strong and improving swachh Bharat ranking of the cities that we operate in positions us well to capture emerging opportunities in the fast evolving municipal solid waste sector.
With all these efforts combined with a resilient business model, a disciplined execution and a committed team, we are confident in our ability to deliver sustainable growth and long term value to our stakeholders in the quarters ahead. This concludes our remarks. We would now like to open the. Floor for Q and A. Thank You.
Questions and Answers:
operator
Thank you very much. We will now begin with the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press star and one on the Touchstone phone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue you may press star and 2. Participants are requested to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question comes from the line of Gaurav Gandhi from Glorytale Capital Management. Please go ahead.
Gaurav Gandhi
Yeah. Thanks for the opportunity, sir. Congratulations on good set of number. Just one question, sir. As we have achieved good success in PCMC waste to energy plant and government also focusing on such energy projects, are there any more such opportunities visible?
N G Subramanian
Good afternoon, Gaurav. Yes. We are definitely looking at wte to be the next growth focus for the company. There are few tenders which are already out. We have already participated in few of them. We expect the results to be declared shortly. So we will be able to get back on that growth path.
Gaurav Gandhi
All right. Thank you.
operator
Thank you. Before we move towards the next question we would like to remind participants you may press star and one to ask a question. The next question comes from the line of Bhavya Gandhi from Dalal and Brokerage Stockbroking. Please go ahead.
Bhavya Gandhi
Yeah, hi. Thanks for the opportunity. Hope I’m audible. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So just wanted to understand which are the upcoming projects whose revenue we have still not booked in. And historically we’ve been guiding for a 25% CAGR. But in last two to three years we’ve not seen that number coming across. So if you can just provide some light on that.
N G Subramanian
Yeah, Bhavya. So we have bid for few projects. Few of them are from the southern part of the country and two of. Them are from the western part of the country. We would not like to name the project since they are in the bidding. Process going back to our guidance of 25% CAGRAD growth that spread over four to five years. So if you look at the numbers. From 2022 onwards we have been able. To grow our revenue from 600 crores. To around 900 crores. And we would be likely to show positive trends once the new project that we bid for gets into the billing cycle for us. So the numbers that are shown today, for example the Q1 core operating revenue growth of 13%. Those are all from contracts that already been executed today. There are no upcoming projects revenue which has been baked into those numbers. So any future growth which you are confident to back will help us achieve the target that the management has set. Itself for.
Bhavya Gandhi
Sure. And are there any contracts are going to expire in the current revenue that we have already put in? Just wanted to get some understanding or flavor for next two, three years. I understand that new contracts are underway. But from the existing ones. Are there any contracts which are going to expire?
N G Subramanian
There is one contract which we are. Executing in the city of Mumbai. This is a collection and transportation contract. Which contributes to not more than 3% of the console number. So that is expiring by December 2025. But the new tenders are already out. We are already submitted our bid stage for that.
Bhavya Gandhi
Any quantum you can provide on the newer tenders. What size are we looking out for? What would be the ROC and some matrix. If you can provide.
N G Subramanian
The size would be similar to the ones that’s expiring or slightly more. Given the fact that all of them are expiring higher amounts of capital employment and the return metrics would be equal if not better than what we already have in our books.
Bhavya Gandhi
Okay, fair enough. And sir, on the construction debris, how much has been the revenue booked in this quarter? If you can provide some number.
N G Subramanian
This quarter is soft because it’s monsoon. So we don’t see significant traction coming in the second first quarter part and till the month of July. So the numbers are very soft. It won’t be more than 8 crores from my estimate. Because of the tonnage that been shipped is very low. We expect tonnages to improve from the end of second quarter till the end of fourth quarter. That’s the seasonality in the TND business.
Bhavya Gandhi
Got it. That we envisage from the Mumbai Waste processing facility that we have. If the stay order gets removed, what would be the risk inherit if at all? One has to shift this location.
N G Subramanian
So from the tender condition, the risk for the concession act that is Anthony’s subsidiary is almost zero. The reason is zero because it the tender kind of absolves us as an operator from the risk related to the usage of land. Because that is under the purview of BNC and Maharashtra government. So from a risk perspective the answer is zilch. The land has to be identified for fresh waste processing. We would have to move the assets to the fresh land. The cost involved in moving our assets to the fresh area will be borne by BMC and refunded to the company.
So the cost of movement, the cost associated with the time delay and loss. Of profit are all captured in the existing tender.
Bhavya Gandhi
Got it. And so just last thing on the EBITDA guidance, if you can provide historically you’ve been saying 25% odd levels. You can still guide for next two three years. What is the broad number that one should walk out with?
N G Subramanian
I think we are. Over the last three quarters we have been able to capitalize a slight increase in EBITDA margin. We are now at our last six. Quarter high EBITDA number on the reported front. So we would like to go the same number for now for the next two to three quarters before we bag any significantly large contracts. So 23 to 23 and a half percent EBITDA margin is something that is there for us.
Bhavya Gandhi
Fair enough sir. Thank you so much. Really appreciate all the answers. And I’ll get back in the queue.
operator
Thank you. A reminder to all participants. If you wish to ask a question you may press star and 1. The next question comes from the line of Nirav Dalal from MIB Securities India. Please go ahead.
Neerav Dalal
Yeah, hello. Thank you for the opportunity. I would just want to continue with the Kanchur Marg High Court Supreme Court ruling or stay. But. So I believe that that contract would be material to our operations at the moment. So. So any change there though it might be part of the contract. But wouldn’t it have a material impact on the operations of the company? And what are the remediation measures that we would be taking?
N G Subramanian
Yeah. Good afternoon Veera. So let me put things into perspective now. If you look at the Kanjur Marg facility. That’s the only facility for the entire city of Mumbai which can handle 6,500 tons of waste a day. So if you were to ask and go by the High Court’s order of shutting it down. The first question that has been raised is where will this waste go? And to answer that Supreme Court Chief justice asked this. So that is the response which nobody has today. So the plan of action from BMC. And from Maharashtra government is to get. Tools ruling out and kind of squash the High Court order and also try and remedy the denotification order that was erroneously passed. So that is on the existence existential question of Kanjur as a waste processing site for the city of Mumbai. B as operators of the site we are kind of absorbed from the entire issue. Mainly because we are an operator on a land which has been assigned to absorb handle waste by the client. So tomorrow the client is forced to shift the operation to some other site. Till that day we will continue doing the operation which is witnessed by the facts of the matter.
The way it is today and the. Day the corporation identifies a new land we have to move our operation to that new site and for which all costs will be refunded by the client to us. So from a cash flow point of view, from a revenue point of view, and from a liability and a risk point of view, everything is hedged completely end to end. So we don’t see any risk to our project over here.
Neerav Dalal
Okay, got that? My second question was. So come out with another bio mining project. Where? Is there any specific reason why we did not participate in that contract? Or is it because the margins were lower? If you could just elaborate on that.
N G Subramanian
You are referring to the one which was awarded in deonar and backed by. A company called Navyuga Engineering. Right. So the contract specifications were too stringent. One second is we technically didn’t qualify because one of the main condition is the company should have handled 18.5 million. Tons of waste in three to four. Years, which we have not done. So technically we were not qualified. Neither had we have the experience of. Moving earth or soil of that magnitude in our experience. So on technical parameters, we were not being able to breach the mark. Neither would we form a JV to achieve the same because the tender didn’t. Allow JV to be formed. So on technical parameters, we were not able to qualify for that contract. And also on operational side note, 18.5 million tons to be biomined in three years, including monsoon, effectively means 20,000 tons of waste to be biomined from the city center and shipping it out required a large amount of focus, which we felt A, we didn’t qualify on the tender aspect and B, we felt it at the price that was was granted and the costing worked out. We found it to be suboptimal.
Neerav Dalal
Okay. So just for an effort, for example, the Citco project, what would be the size of that?
N G Subramanian
The citco project is 1.4 million tons. Oh, it’s 1.4 million tons. Over three years. Over two years. Over two years.
Neerav Dalal
Okay. The other question I had was on this, the EPR thing that you’ve spoken about for the Pune project, if you could elaborate, is the amount material to the scheme of things or how should one look at it? That is number one, the number. Number two is so RDF and compost, where would those revenues sit and what would be the percentage of that? So if you could just elaborate on these two.
N G Subramanian
Right. On the EPR aspect, it is not material at the console level, but it’s definitely material at the operating company level, which is Anthony Lara Renewables, which is. The entity which is executing the PCMC wt. It definitely adds to the EBITDA profile and it will be a slightly material amount going forward on the sale of. Recyclables like compost and rdf. That would sit in our other income line. And today they contribute to close to 4% of our consol revenue which was 0.2% to last year which has increased to 2.3% now is around a shade below 4%.
Neerav Dalal
Okay, but it will be part of the other income and not the contracts.
N G Subramanian
And no, no it won’t be part of the contract.
Neerav Dalal
Okay. And lastly have we seen a decline, a decline in debt in this. In this quarter? Have we paid?
N G Subramanian
Yeah, we have repaid close to 60 crores of debt from March onwards till June. That is part of the process normal procedural aggressive debt repayment policy that we adopt. So we have repaid close to 62 crores of debt income in the first quarter of the financial year.
Neerav Dalal
Yeah. Correct. Because. Yeah, it has come down to 448 again some five more than 500 crores last year. Got that. I’ll come back. Thank you.
operator
Thank you. Before we take the next question we would like to remind participants. You may press star and one to ask a question. The next question comes from the line of Prachi Sharma from AC Investors. Please go ahead. Yes Ms. Sharma, your line has been.
Unidentified Participant
Hi sir. Good afternoon sir. Just two questions. One that we’ve been talking about vehicle scrapping and tire recycling business for quite some time now. Just wanted an update. What are your views? What are we doing on that front? And secondly if I just go ahead with the question also we are planning to reduce our CNT contribution and increasing the processing contribution. Any actions that we are taking anything over there?
N G Subramanian
Yeah. So to answer your first part of auto scrapping and the tire recycling, we are definitely working on those parameters. We have already given a market study report. We have started scouting the areas and we feel currently that’s a management view that we would like to go slightly slow on that given the market maturity at this point of time. But we expect to work on these parameters as one of the broad management views to de risk the business model by getting into a non municipal revenue. So those two parameters of auto and tyre recycling are definitely still under consideration by the management.
The pace of growth and focus would be slightly slower given the market opportunities the way it is today and the margin profile the way it is being exhibited by the existing players. On the aspect of growing our processing component versus the CND operation. If you look at our Q1 26 numbers we have definitely seen an increase in the Profile of revenue generation from processing versus cnt. If you look at last year’s performance, we were looking at 60%. Sorry, 59% and 26% from processing. The processing is now contributing to 28% which has been a slight increase over those parameters.
And CND is remaining flat. So the larger chunk of growth is coming from processing contracts for the company in the current financial year as compared to last year.
Unidentified Participant
Understood. Sir. On the first question you want to commit on any timeline here.
N G Subramanian
There is no point talking about timeline till the time the company has a viable project. Which can be scalable. I mean as a waste management company. Our focus continues to remain in MSW space. Given the fact that that is still the need of the hour and that gives us a double digit EBITDA margin and a single digit PAT margin, we are not able to replicate the same profile in a non municipal business today. So our growth focus continues to remain in msw. But we are always scouting for opportunities till the time we are convinced. Internally these profile of non municipal business is commensurate to the return of on a rupee basis for our existing business. We would like to be very cautious before spending money into a project for which we are not convinced about it.
Unidentified Participant
Sure, sir. I’ll get back in the queue. All the best. Thank you.
operator
Thank you. A reminder to all participants, if you wish to ask a question, you may press star and 1. The next question comes from the line of Amita Gicha from HG Hawa. Please go ahead.
Faisal Hawa
My question. This is Faisal. How are. My question is with regards to our project in Pune. So you feel that the PLI can further go up and what effect would it have on it on our EBITDA?
N G Subramanian
So the PLF for the first quarter was 84%. I mean that’s softer. Mainly because we took 11 days of planned maintenance shutdown. So normally if you look at an average PLF that we are targeting, it should be upwards of 88 to 90% is what we look at. But normally there will always be a planned maintenance shutdown because of the fact. Of feedstock and repairs and maintenance. That is as per the norms given. By Hitachi Joseph for us. So any significant improvement in EBITDA would be offset by planned maintenance shutdown. But if I say if I were to look at a PLF of 90% versus 84%, there will be at least a 250 to 300bps expansion in my EBITDA of that particular operating asset.
Faisal Hawa
What did you say would be the 300 percentage points?
N G Subramanian
300Bps. Yes if the PLF improves from 84 to 90.
Faisal Hawa
We have been promising around 24, 25% CAGR. I know that it is over a period of three to four years but of late the growth at least in the sales has been a little anemic. So what are the steps that management is taking to address those?
N G Subramanian
So Mr. How what the management has done is that we’ve been very acutely looking at new contracts that’s being put up for bidding and we are definitely putting our hat in the race in those contracts which ensure that the profitability and the margins and the client profile. I mean you should remember that we work in municipal solid based business so we don’t want to swing at each and every order that has been put. On the bidding stage. So we are very conscious. We have been working with few municipal corporations and we are actually actively chasing few projects which we feel will help us achieve the targets that we have set ourselves off which we also communicated to all the stakeholders. So we are working towards achieving these numbers and we will be able to give you some more color in the current or the next quarter.
Faisal Hawa
Is it the right statement to make. That at least in bio mining now we will be amongst the most recognizable players and we should be able to get even more contracts there
N G Subramanian
in the biomining space. 1We are definitely one of the serious contenders for any new projects. The only limiting factor for biomining projects is the corporation’s budget allocation for that activity and the availability of low lying area to get rid of the rejects of soil which cannot be sold otherwise. So to answer your question yes we. Are a very serious and a large. Contender in the bio mining space in India and viability of the project is. On a case to case basis.
Faisal Hawa
Thank you so much.
operator
Thank you. A reminder to all participants if you wish to ask a question you may press star and 1. The next question comes from the line of from MIB Securities India. Please go ahead.
Neerav Dalal
Thank you again for your opportunity. Very quick one. So for the current year say for fiscal year 27 we would maintain you know 4 to 6% volume growth and then another 3 to 4% value growth would be. Would that be a right assumption or there are certain contracts which are not at the moment fully operational so if you could just give us some indication on that.
N G Subramanian
So Neeruv on the existing profile I mean we already shown a 13% core operating revenue growth on the same platform. So on a year on year basis 8 to 10% growth is something that is baked in the numbers the way. It is stacked today. We expect the volumes at the construction demolition waste to move upwards from the end of second quarter onwards. So that will be the positive flip to the numbers to help us achieve those kind of targeted revenue growth.
Neerav Dalal
Okay, so, but, so it would not be wrong in saying that. Okay, an 8 to 10% growth. So we did 13% for this quarter.
N G Subramanian
But so we are being conservative. We are given the fact that the existing RCR and contract, the one in MCGM CNT contract which is expiring in December. So I am not including the last quarter revenue over there, just being conservative over here when we give these numbers. So definitely there will be a uptick when the new project kicks in. So that will kind of more than compensate us to and achieve these numbers that we have stated ourselves.
Neerav Dalal
So one can say that the current, current quarter performance could be something that one can look ahead for for the full year in terms of revenue growth and margins.
N G Subramanian
Yes, got that.
Neerav Dalal
Thanks a lot. Thank you.
operator
Thank you. A reminder to all participants, if you wish to ask a question. Question you may press star and 1. As there are no further questions from the participants, I now hand the conference over to Mr. Subramanyanji for closing comments. Thank you. And over to you, sir.
N G Subramanian
Thank you. Hi. I would like to take a moment. To thank our dedicated team for the. Incredible contribution to our success. The tireless effort has been essential in. Achieving our goals and we will continue. To build on the momentum. We are committed to investing in innovation and leveraging our expertise to strengthen our market position and ensure that the clients, whichever are ranking, remain the way they. Are or at least improve on the base of what they have achieved. I am particularly excited about our WTE. Section which is showing all kind of. Promises and growth going forward. Thank you and wish you all a very pleasant evening ahead. Thank you.
operator
Thank you. On behalf of Anthony Waste Handling Cell Ltd. That concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us and you will now disconnect your line. Thank you.