PVR INOX Ltd (NSE: PVRINOX) Q3 2026 Earnings Call dated Feb. 05, 2026
Corporate Participants:
Unidentified Speaker
Analysts:
Unidentified Participant
Abhishek Banerjee — Analyst
Abneesh Roy — Analyst
Jinesh Joshi — Analyst
Priya Darshi — Analyst
Siddhant Dand — Analyst
Umang Mehta — Analyst
Vivekanand Subbaraman — Analyst
Presentation:
operator
Sam sa. Sat. Sa. Ladies and Gentlemen, good day and welcome to PVR inocs Q3FY26 earning conference call. As a reminder, all participants lines 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 the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing Star then zero on your touchstone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Abhishek Banerjee from ICICI Securities. Thank you and over to you.
Abhishek Banerjee — Analyst
Good afternoon everyone. On behalf of ICICI Securities, I welcome. You to the Q3 and 9 month FY26 post results earnings call for PBR Inox Ltd. The call will begin with brief management remarks on the earnings performance followed by. An interactive Q and A session. PVR INOX Management will be Represented by Mr. Raja Bijni, Managing Director, Mr. Sanjeev Kumar, Executive Director, Mr. Gaurav Sharma, Chief Financial Officer and other Senior management personnel over you. Over to you Mr. Ajay Bhujiri for your opening comments. Thanks sir.
Unidentified Speaker
Thank you. Good afternoon everyone. Like to welcome you to discuss the unaudited results for the quarter and the nine month period ending December 31, 2025. We uploaded the earnings presentation and the results on our company’s and the stock exchanges websites earlier today and I hope you’ve had a chance to review them. Let me begin with the broader industry context first. Calendar 2025 emerged as the strongest year ever for the Indian theatrical business with highest ever All India gross box office collections of 13,400 crores up 13% year on year and nearly 32% up above pre pandemic levels.
Notably, 37 films crossed the 100 crore mark, the highest ever reinforcing the depth, resilience and long term relevance of the theatrical medium in India. Original Hindi language films contributed substantially to the growth. Hindi box office delivers its strongest year ever with collections of over 5,500 crores representing an 18% year on year growth. This performance was supported by a healthier genre mix and more consistent release Slate led by a few large tentpole releases including Durandar which has emerged as the highest grossing Hindi film of all time with cumulative box office of 1000 crores. Hollywood also staged a strong recovery in India delivering its best post pandemic year with box office collections of 1400 crores up 49% year on year.
Aided by a stronger and more consistent content slate, Regional Cinema continued to deepen and diversify its contribution in calendar year 2025. Overall regional box office grew by 4% year on year led by standout performances and select languages. Gujarati cinema recorded a sharp 188% year on year growth supported by Lalo Krishna Sadha Saha which became the first Gujarati film to cross 100 crores. Kannada cinema grew 74% year on year driven by Kantara, Chapter 1 and Su from so a. Malayalam cinema crossed 1000 crores milestone for the second consecutive year, reinforcing its strong content credibility and loyal audience space.
During the quarter we welcomed 40.5 million guests to our cinemas. The representing a growth of 9% year on year, occupancy improved to about 28.5% compared to 25.7% in Q3 last year reflecting both the strength of content and the impact of various footfall driving initiatives we’ve been implementing. Average ticket price and food and beverage spend per head both increased by 4% year on year to 293 and 146 rupees reflecting stable consumer spend trends on the back of a strong performance from titles such as Gurander and Avatar, Fire and Ash. December emerged as the third highest month in terms of admissions and the highest month post pandemic in terms of revenue and ebitda highlighting the operating leverage inherent in strong content led footfall recovery.
In terms of the financial results for the quarter, the following numbers were calculated after adjusting for the impact of India’s 116 on lease accounting. Our total revenue for the quarter was 1908 crores, EBITDA was 344 crores and PAAT was 115 crores as compared to revenue of 1739 crores, a bit of 258 crores and PAT of 68 crores. In the same period last year we recognized a one time provision of 44.6 crores in Q3 relating to adoption of the New Labour Codes treated as an exceptional item below EBITDA impacting reported PAT for the quarter. Importantly for two consecutive quarters now, the business has delivered 18% EBITDA margins at an occupancy of around 28% compared to pre Covid levels where similar margins were achieved at 350 to 400 with higher occupancies.
This underlines the sustained benefit of merger synergies and structural cost optimization resulting in a more resilient and efficient operating model. During the quarter we added 20 new screens while exiting three underperforming screens located in malls that are nearing end of their life cycle. Year to date we have added 62 new screens and exited 11 loss making screens and are on track to add nearly 100 new screens in FY26. Staying true to our capital Light and scalable growth strategy, we now have 149 screens signed under the capital light model, of which 54 screens are under the FOCO model and 95 strings under the Asset Light model.
We remain focused on generating healthy free cash flows, deleveraging and strengthening our balance sheet. As of December 31, 2025, net debt reduced to 365 crores, representing more than 1000 crores reduction since the merger driven by strong free cash flows and disciplined capital allocation strategy. In line with this focus, last month we concluded the divestment of our entire stake in 4700 BC premium snacking brand to Marico for an all cash consideration of 226.8 crores, further strengthening our balance sheet and moving us closer to negligible net debt levels. Looking ahead to calendar year 2026, we’re increasingly optimistic on the outlook for the theatrical industry with content visibility that is stronger and evenly distributed.
The Hindi slate for 2026 is anchored by several large and mid scale films including Durandar 2 King starring Shah Rukh Khan, Ramayana Part 1 starring Ranbir Kapoor, Battle of Galwan with Salman Khan, Drishyam 3, Love and War O Romeo, Bhoot, Bangla and Damal 4amongst many others. Regional cinema also enters the year with strong momentum led by titles such as Toxic, Fozzie and Jailer 2. While Hollywood pipeline for India looks particularly robust with high profile releases including Avengers, Doomsday, the Odyssey, Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat 2 and Dune 3. These collectively provide a healthy mix of franchise extensions, event films and mass appeal entertainers.
Our current screen Portfolio stands at 1791 screens across 358 cinemas in 112 cities in India and Sri Lanka. Thank you once again for joining us today and I now open the floor for any questions you may have.
Questions and Answers:
operator
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press N1 on their touchstone telephone. If you wish to remove yourself from the question queue, you may press 2. Participants are requested to use handset while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. The first question is from the line of Avnish Roy from Nuama. Please go ahead.
Abneesh Roy
Yeah, thanks. First question is on advertising revenue. We have seen GST rate cut in many of the consumption segments. So any change? Are you seeing post that and FY27 outlook. How do you expect ad revenue? For the entire year.
Unidentified Speaker
Ad revenue has been slow this quarter. It’s largely on account of the fact that we had fewer marketable films. While Dhuranda really caught up a lot in November we were devoid of any big title. And advertising as against the core cinema business works on perception of a big blockbuster film. Last year, same quarter we had eight very marketable films whereas in this quarter we had only four. That kind of dented the advertising. But having said that, we believe that we are on the path of being able to post a marginal growth over last year.
Unidentified Speaker
But Abdish, I must say that you picked up one thing but overall ATP, sph, number of people who are coming, the EBITDA margin. So even if there’s a bit of a dent in advertising, which as Gautam said is temporary, I think overall we are very happy with the kind of performance that we’ve given and we fired on all cylinders.
Abneesh Roy
Sure. 4700 VC divestment I think makes a lot of sense. My question is next two years, anything. More we can do in terms of any property, any other kind of a. Cash flow generation, any more plans?
Unidentified Speaker
Well, you know, because of our focal model and asset light models, I think the cash flow generation has become healthy and with a strong lineup that is there. So I think even if you don’t have anything to divest, there is still accruals will be enough to take care and strong control that we have around CapEx as well as operating expenditures are going to ensure that debt levels which have already come down a lot can come further down to negligible levels.
Abneesh Roy
So thanks, that’s all from my team. Thank you.
operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Jinesh Joshi from PL Capital. Please go ahead.
Jinesh Joshi
Yeah, thanks for the opportunity sir. My question again is on 4700 VC, given the divestment to Marico, will the brand get discontinued in our cinemas and correspondingly there will be a revenue loss or will we source it from the supplier and continue to sell? That is one. And if it is latter, what could be the incremental impact on margins that you may see?
Unidentified Speaker
You see 1800, roughly over 1800 crores is our revenue on FNB and 4700 BC gourmet popcorn was only being sold on 50 of our screens and 50 of our properties and represented only 13 crores of revenue. So it is less than 1%. Having said that, it will continue to sell in our premium properties. So it will hardly have any dent on our margins or hardly have any dent on our revenues because our focus is on in cinema FNB more than out of cinema fnb. And as I said it will continue to sell in the cinemas.
You know, where it was selling and we, you know. So there’s not going to be any dent whatsoever.
Jinesh Joshi
Understood. And second question again is on the ad revenue. While you highlighted the reason as to why there was a YY decline. But I just wanted a clarification on two small sections. First is that was there any cut down in the ad time this quarter versus the base quarter and is it possible to share? I mean how much of the inventory typically do we sell at a pre contracted rate and how much is sold on the spot to just get a sense as to whether these also had played any role in terms of revenue decline.
Gautam, can you answer that please?
Unidentified Speaker
Sorry. It’s largely. We had a lean weeks and month this quarter where we did not get enough advertising. So clearly the volume dipped. It wasn’t about the yield at all. We control our yield very strongly in the market and ensure that the yields don’t get affected. But the sheer demand does go down. When there are films that technically do well at the box office. People are coming in but don’t have the perception for advertisers to come in. Now to answer your other question. On an average we sell about 14 to 15 minutes of advertising. This is all averaged out at the end of the year.
That’s the kind of time we utilize per show per auditorium.
Jinesh Joshi
Got that one. One small follow up question. Can you share what is our screen outlook guidance for 27 and the CapEx figure?
Unidentified Speaker
First of all, we’ll be opening about 96 screens roughly this year. And next year we’re looking at about 150 odd screens to open and CAPEX intensity. Gaurav, can you just help me out there?
Unidentified Speaker
Yeah. It will be between 350 to 400 crore of capex outlay that we are planning for next year. All inclusive including new screens plus renovations and maintenance.
Jinesh Joshi
Sure sir. Thank you. Thank you so much and all the best.
operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Kavish Marek from BNK Securities. Please go ahead.
Unidentified Participant
Hi team. Thanks for the opportunity and congratulations on two great quarters consecutively. My first question pertains on the debt side. So second quarter of a solid show. On the net debt front I believe the company remains well placed to be NEC debt free by end of FY26 if not by 1Q FY27 max. But on the gross debt, do you plan to pare it gradually while holding on to cash or Will there be accelerated payments on the gross debt front? That was my first question.
Unidentified Speaker
We will, you know. One is the scheduled repayment of gross debt, which is largely termed in our case that will happen. On top of that we will also prepay some of the gross debt using the surplus cash that we are carrying. So that exercise will take place over the course of next couple of months. So we are expecting that gross debt levels will also fall materially by the time we’ll finish this financial year.
Unidentified Participant
Understood. And secondly, given that content has been doing well for some time now and the near term also appears promising, do you find any low hanging fruits to extract more juice for realizations like ATP and spx? And secondly, do you find the need to have a loyalty program to sort of lock in users at times like these when consumers are more likely to enroll for any loyalty based offerings? Times when content is doing well.
Unidentified Speaker
So first on the loyalty, we see there are schemes today and we believe that when we’ve been studying consumer very closely, when there is a big film that a cohort wants to watch, there are enough and more deals that are being given more personalized, more targeted and sharpened deals so that we can get more footfalls to the cinema. We believe that a loyalty program on a broader base does not work because every film has a very different fan following and those have to be targeted with more specific deals. And given our marketing department and the way we are using AI, we are able to now target a much smaller, sharper cohort of audience and work out deals for them to get better footfalls.
In terms of your question on ATP and sph, the reality remains that bigger firms, stronger firms do garner and different format firms do garner a higher ATP. And that will continue to happen on even ground every year we are looking at about 3 1/2 4% increase in ATP and that will be the trend going forward. And so the case with the SPH as well.
Unidentified Participant
Understood, understood. And just to reconfirm the screen addition target that you mentioned both for F26 and 2727 especially, is that on a net basis?
Unidentified Speaker
Yeah, I think we are talking about gross new screen additions. The screen exits will be negligible because bulk of the underperforming screens have been closed in financial year 24 and financial year 25. So you know, the gross screen additions and the net screen additions will not be substantially different.
Unidentified Participant
Understood. Understood. That was super helpful. If I can squeeze in a follow up on the debt front. You plan to sell off some of your properties. A few quarters ago realizations were expected to be around 3 billion odd. Now, with net debt levels coming down and Grosgrit also being at comfortable level, do you still plan to sell those off? Is there any progress on that front?
Unidentified Speaker
So, you know, I think we will be very careful about what sort of, you know, value that we will get. Even in the past we have explored options but we decided not to sell. And the case for selling properties is now not so much there, given the fact that the overall liquidity levels in the company is pretty healthy and balance sheet is stronger. Also some of the properties that we own have operating cinemas which are generating positive ebitda. So we would also take that into account when we look at assessing any property sale.
Unidentified Participant
Understood, that was helpful. Thank you so much and all the very best.
operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Priya Darshi, an individual investor. Please go ahead.
Priya Darshi
Hi. Thank you for taking my question and congrats on a good set of results. I just wanted to, you know, talk about how do you look at the business from an annual point of view? So like there are still variations across quarters even though last two quarters have been consecutively very good and very good execution on the debiting front. But how do we look at fourth quarter and also on a yearly basis, where do the occupancy rates? Do you think that, you know, there was a little bit of consumption slowdown which also played into it and therefore the occupancy rate moves out from here or it will stay where it is on an annual basis.
Unidentified Speaker
Kamal, you would like to take that.
Unidentified Speaker
I think on an annual basis Q4 traditionally has been a weak quarter, the weakest quarter amongst all the quarters. But that said, this quarter, because we’ve got toxic runda right towards the end of the fourth quarter, one can expect some aggressive numbers. But I think overall, I think you should see Q4 in line with what we have done in the past few years in terms of Q4 as a ratio vis a vis Q3 or Q2, one of the higher generating quarters. So that sort of trend, that sort of framework is what would continue. And I think we have a long history of performances pre Covid as well as post Covid.
So there’s enough data to sort of look at various quarters and their relations. So that’s one aspect. But in terms of the larger question that you’re posing, which is are these occupancies sustainable and how should we sort of, you know, factor them going forward in our numbers? I think these occupancies definitely are sustainable. And the reason we say that is that post Covid. Of course there were a lot of structural changes, you know, consumption pattern changes. The content supply went through its own share of disruption because a lot of films were traveling straight to streamers and because the consumer taste had changed, producers also took some time to sort of adjust their filmmaking as per that taste.
But now all of those factors have fallen into place. The content cycle is pretty much well oiled and working in a very synchronized manner like the way it used to work pre Covid. There are hardly any gaps between weeks. Films are very well spaced out. There are a lot of wide releases, you know, films which go out in maximum number of theaters, big star cars, big production values, broad based successes. Not just the bigger films are working, but mid sized, smaller films are also succeeding. So I think the content cycle is pretty much in shape and one should expect sustenance in terms of occupancies.
I would go to the extent of saying that our best years are ahead of us, are ahead of us. We’ve not yet seen our best years. Post Covid 2627, just on paper, looking at the slate is looking like a very, very strong year. You know, the kind of content mix we have in Hollywood, Hindi and regional cinema is so strong that we would, you know, stick our neck out and say that 2627 definitely would surpass what we’ve seen in 2526. I’ll pause and if you have any follow up question, happy to answer.
Unidentified Participant
That’s very happening. Thanks a lot. I just have one follow up like when you do the benchmarking of content, right. Because this year was also cyclical recovery. We saw in terms of content quality, etc. So what gives you the confidence to say that, you know, next year is on each year, benchmark the two years it is going to be better. What are the factors that I know that in our business it can be, we can still see a difference right when the actual numbers comes. But the point is what are the drivers? How do you benchmark these two years?
Unidentified Speaker
I think if you look at the breadth of content in terms of offerings, we’ve got a great mix of big budget, big star driven films, mid level films which are more content driven, smaller films which continue to surprise at the box office. Well supported by regional cinema in all wings. So not just Tamil, Telugu, Malayalam, Kannada, but also in languages which are up and coming like Gujarati films. A lot of action happening on the Bengali front. And Hollywood is finally getting its act together in terms of films which go wide, you know, release in US in 2000 or more theaters, that number has been consistently going up.
All studios, including Paramount and Universal have been talking about increasing the number of wider releases in their slate. They’re talking about increasing their overall slate, but they’re also talking about, in addition to that, they’re also talking about increasing the wider releases in their slate. So when you look at the quality of films getting better, quantity going up, you feel confident that the next year would be much more buoyant as compared to this year. So these are some of the factors that we watch very closely.
Unidentified Participant
That makes sense. Thanks a lot. One last question from my end. So you have, you know, you have demonstrated that you are achieving the same ebitda margin at 28.5% occupancy, which you used to do at 32% occupancy. And therefore what other Runway do you have there? And that this point, 28.5. Can it go down further? Gaurav, do you want to take this?
Unidentified Speaker
I think it’s already at a very optimal and healthy level in terms of the margins. If you look at it at 28% occupancy, 18% margin. Having said that, there are still line items in our P and L where we are working towards optimizing. For example, electricity cost is one area where if you notice we have seen a 4% year on year drop because we are deploying solar panels on the rooftops of many of our cinemas which are on the top floor of the malls. We will accelerate that deployment further. Also, you know, rental renegotiations and seeking discounts and moving from more to more revenue share kind of deals will further the overall rental cost more efficient.
So I would say that to answer your question, state in terms of margins, it could be a slight. There is a kind of disturbance among. From your end. Yes, it’s good. Now. Does that answer your question or do you want. Connection?
operator
The line for Mr. Ajay has been disconnected. We are connecting him back again.
Unidentified Speaker
You don’t need to connect Mr. Bijli back. I think he’s dropped off. But the answer was to the question raised by Priyadharshini. If, if that addresses your question, maybe we can move on to the next one.
operator
All right. The next question comes from the line of Siddhant from Goodwill. Please go ahead.
Siddhant Dand
Yeah, hi, I wanted to ask about now that we are very likely to be net debt free by 31st March. Any plans on restarting final dividends and buybacks considering the low promoter stake? And just a follow up to that, what is the Runway to the promoter pledge ahead.
Unidentified Speaker
So I think, you know, capital allocation with respect to distribution to shareholders is a decision that the board will take at the right time. We will not be able to give any guidance on that at this stage. But you know, the cash which is there will be definitely used towards reducing debt as well as funding growth as we are also, you know, we had said earlier that there are ample growth opportunities in the country. There are markets where multiplex penetration is low and those are pretty attractive markets. So we will take a holistic picture in terms of how we deploy the capital and accordingly decide at this stage there is no, you know, guidance on any dividend or distribution.
Okay. And on the promoter pledge. On the promoter pledge, I think the pledge levels have been pretty sort of at the same level for quite some time. We don’t expect that to change or rather we don’t expect that to increase.
Siddhant Dand
Okay, that’s okay. My one more question was about our tax shield and our tax losses. How much would they be and how much do we expect it to be. Utilized over the next two, three years?
Unidentified Speaker
I think we have, you know, our estimate is that our deferred tax assets will be utilized fully over the course of next three and a half to four years. So from a tax perspective, we have, you know, enough losses to absorb any future tax payouts for the next three to four years.
Siddhant Dand
Okay, that’s good. About our. So one is that, you know, because we’ve been asset light and you know. We’Ve been doing less lesser capex. Do we expect maintenance capex to go up now because there’s less stress on our balance sheet because we do not want the quality of cinema going down, right?
Unidentified Speaker
Oh absolutely. I think, you know, customer experience is paramount and we are pretty much focused in terms of maintaining the standards of our older cinemas. In fact, we will be deploying a greater percentage of Capex towards renovation of our high value cinemas where the overall look and feel of the cinema now looks dated as compared to the new properties that we are opening. We are also upgrading many of our cinemas with newer technologies. Better projection and sound system, overall seating. So the CAPEX outlet towards renovation will be slightly higher in upcoming years. Also, renovation is far less risky as compared to opening a new cinema given that, you know, the operating profile of that property and location and the payback periods are much faster as a result.
The return metrics on renovation Capex is also pretty healthy. So yeah, I think we’ll be focused on that piece as going forward.
Siddhant Dand
Okay. And just on the film distribution business, what would be the approximate margin band that we operate over there. You mean in terms of EBITDA margins?
Unidentified Speaker
Yeah. So I think on EBITDA margins we will be roughly in the range of 9%, 8 to 9% overall on the revenues. It’s a business where we sort of take distribution rights and it’s a working capital focused business but a very high return on capital kind of business profile.
Siddhant Dand
Okay, just one last question. So you know when two big films clash, example, the one on the 19th of March or the one, the Hollywood one that’s happening in December this year, is that a benefit for a PVR in terms of pricing and lack of supply or it’s better when films are. Divided over a period of time?
Unidentified Participant
I think you have to see it on case to case basis. There are times when a big regional film, non Hindi Indian film clashes with a big Hindi film. Now that becomes synergistic in the sense that you know, the territories where the films are stronger differ. Right. So suddenly south becomes extremely strong for the regional film, the south, the non Hindi South Indian film and the rest of the territories become very strong for which are Hindi language dominated for the other film. Also I think we’ve seen with many films that in, in terms of capacity we have enough and more for two films to coexist and do something like 110, 125 crore sort of a net box office.
Which translates to something like 135, 140 crore gross box office in a day. All India, all theaters put together now that’s a very healthy number. Typically a big film opens with 50, 55 crore sort of a net box office. The other film tends to open with 20, 25 crore. So even if there are two big films releasing, I’ll use Singham and Gul Bulaya as a case in point. Both released in Diwali, very strong period, both targeting Hindi audiences but very comfortably coexisted and ended up doing very strong numbers for that week and the subsequent weeks in November last year.
Similarly this year we’ve got Dhurandar which is a very, very strong film targeting the Hindi audiences. And then we’ve got Toxic, which is also dubbed in Hindi but is extremely strong in the south Indian markets. Whether it’s Kannada, Tamil or Telugu or even Malayalam for that matter of fact. Which means we can have very strong performance in south and we will also have very strong performance in the rest of the country which is Hindi speaking. And that augurs well for us. That augurs well for the chain because you want all theaters, all Seats to be, you know, filling up when there are big films releasing and Eid is a big week for us.
So yeah, mostly it’s positive. In some cases, films can tend to cannibalize, take away business from each other. It becomes a bit of a negative. Very tough to sort of forecast these things. But more often than not, I would say this is a positive. Okay, just one last question. Any plans to impair or reconsider the goodwill on our balance sheet because it really skews our return ratios?
Unidentified Speaker
No, there are no such plans as of now.
Siddhant Dand
Okay, perfect. Thank you so much.
operator
Thank you. A reminder to all the participants that you may press star and one to ask a question. The next question comes from the line of Umang Mehta from Kotak Securities. Please go ahead.
Umang Mehta
Hi. Thank you for the opportunity and congrats on great consecutive quarter. My first question was on your footfalls. So if we look at calendar 25 you’ve done around 15 crores. This is a decent growth on last year which was around 14 crores. But the year before we were at 15 crores. So if you can share some insights as to how the trends in unique visitors is. Have we seen more unique visitors come through last year versus earlier years? And what, what do you expect on unique visitors in the coming year? That’s the first question. Thanks.
Unidentified Speaker
So we’ve seen more unique visitations in 2025 calendar versus 2024. There has been a healthy growth. That said, we would not like to get into specifics because this is business sensitive information. I hope you understand. But yes, there has been a very, very strong noticeable growth in the unique presentations.
Unidentified Speaker
And I’d also like to add one thing to this. What Kamal said. Our Tuesday promotion has been a huge galvanizer for getting in these new users to the cinemas and it’s been a consistent promotion that we’ve been doing throughout the year and that’s kind of propelled many fence hitter audiences to start now experiencing cinema. So much so that there is a huge audience set now looking to come to cinemas on every Tuesday.
Umang Mehta
Got it. Just one clarification versus calendar year 23 as well. There would have been growth in unique visitors. Yes, got it. The second kind of question had three basically recent developments or some concerns from investors that we were gathering. If you can share some comments on the CCI investigation and latest update, the Netflix Warner Bros. Kind of development globally and on Karnataka price. Yeah, thanks.
Unidentified Speaker
Gaurav. On BPF CCI matter. The process with CCI is ongoing and we are given that it is, you know, subjugates we are fully cooperating with CCI and sharing information. At this point. There is no new material update to share on Karnataka pricing update I you know the Karnataka High Court had state the state government’s order on capping the ticket prices. The matter is again currently subjudice at the high court level. And you know there is currently no cap implemented in Karnataka. We are continuing to engage with all the stakeholders through appropriate legal and regulatory channels. And on Warner Brothers and Netflix.
Maybe Kamal, if you could give some insights on that piece.
Unidentified Speaker
On Warner and Netflix. Again, the matter is ongoing. We continue to monitor it closely with our colleagues in North America, Europe and other parts of the country. It’s an event which is going to have an impact on the global exhibition industry and therefore all exhibitors are looking at the events and the developments in a very close fashion. Now there was a Senate hearing yesterday in us it was well covered by television media and of course a copy of that is also available. A streamed copy of that is available on YouTube. We would encourage everyone to have a look at that video.
Clearly the US Government is also in a very proactive fashion looking at this combination in a very serious fashion because they feel it will impact a lot of stakeholders and not just customers, but also the talent which professionals and talent which is deployed in the entertainment business. But at this point, you know, there are events in motion, not much to comment. I would be observing everything very closely, keeping a tight watch. We will see how things play out as we move forward.
Umang Mehta
Got it. Thank you so much for all your explanations and all the best.
operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Rishi Dilip Modi from RDM Advisory llp. Please go ahead.
Unidentified Participant
Yeah, hi guys. First I have a bunch of questions on the results. I just wanted to understand. Our employee cost kind of eats up the operating leverage that one would expect in this business, especially given how we’ve reduced our costs over the past several quarters. So is there like some variable incentive which is built into the employee cost which is leading to the 10% YoY increase in employee cost? Or it’s I don’t know, like could you just explain that 10% raise our.
Unidentified Speaker
Employee cost typically grows between 7% to 8% in line with the wage escalation. And you know, large portion of our employees are off role employees where at state level minimum wages go up. But particularly in quarter three there has been a slightly higher growth. You’re right there has been a one time non recurring impact of certain team incentives paid out during the quarter. But that’s you know, non recurring only for quarter three. Excluding that impact, the growth in personal cost would have been 6.4% during the quarter. Excluding the incentive, it would have been 6.4% per quarter. Right, right.
Unidentified Speaker
If I heard you correctly understood. Second, now just coming to the business model, I had two questions. First, how do the economics for us stack up for regional films, say a Gujarati film, Punjabi film, Marathi film, versus say a Bollywood film and versus and also within these big production house, versus a smaller production house, bigger distributor, smaller distributor, how do the economics stack up? If you could just give some details.
Unidentified Speaker
So I think you mean the way we share revenue with our suppliers in different languages without getting into specifics. Because again, this is business sensitive information. We tend to have same sharing terms language wise when it comes to Hindi films. What we offer to a big producer we have percentage revenue sharing. So whatever is the collection, a percentage of that is shared with the producers, with the distributor producers. And it’s same across both for each language. Whether it’s a big film or a big producer or a smaller or a mid sized film, it’s the same percentage.
Same applies for Gujarati film, same applies for Tamil, Telugu. Within languages there could be a, you know, differentiated sharing ratio, sharing percentage. But within the language is the same sharing ratio with all producers in all shapes and sizes of films.
Unidentified Participant
Understood. And would I be correct in assuming that Bollywood would be the lowest sharing versus then followed by South Indian and then finally the other languages. They’re all competitive is what we would say. Okay, all right. So not much gap between the sharing differential.
Unidentified Participant
Sure. Second, with the advent of AI, especially on the media front, bringing the costs down, do you see more pipeline of production or lower cost of production for the production houses which will ensure that say better content or more content comes out. And secondly, in the past we have been producers, but then we stopped being producers. And given the recent success of animated films like Narsimha, do you think you would want to get into the animated side of this business? Especially with AI now bringing the costs down, Would you be open to that and hence ensure that you can fill up periods when there is no content?
Unidentified Speaker
So AI and various other tools and other advancements are definitely helping producers, content creators towards data driven learnings, analytical advancements, better understanding of audience behavior, automation improvements are getting enhanced with every passing month. And that of course improves the way people conceptualize or program content or write a film. So their understanding of what could work resonate with a large number of people is improving because of these advancements and learnings we in our business and other exhibitors use them to improve their pricing decisions, various operating decisions, various operating platforms. We are able to enhance, improve upon using technology, automation, AI.
And of course from marketing perspective, it makes, and I think Gautam spoke about it earlier, targeted marketing. You know, all of these things are providing material benefits quarter after quarter to both producers and exhibitors. But I won’t go as far as saying that AI is ready to make a film which can be theatrical in nature or even for that matter of fact, which could be released on a streaming platform or another distribution platform, but it was produced end to end using AI. I won’t go that far. I the way we see it from our prism, technology is not advanced to that level.
At least at this point. We will see what happens. We are watching these developments very closely. We will see what happens in future. But at this point, in near term, that doesn’t seem likely. Your second question about us getting into production. We are a prolific distributor. We are actively involved in, engaged in working with producers and ensuring that their films get the best marketing and distribution exploitation as and when they’re ready to release. At this point we have no plans to go back to production. If anything changes, of course, we would definitely come back and report it.
operator
Mr. Rishu, you may rejoin the queue for the follow up questions. The next question comes from the line of Vivekanand from Ambit retailer and developer. Please go ahead.
Vivekanand Subbaraman
Yeah, hi, this is Vivek from Ambit. I have two questions. One is on the unique visitors to your cinema screens. You said that they are growing. I would like to know from you the extent of booking that happens through online platforms and the data sharing that you get from these platforms. That’s number one. So how confident are you in being able to gauge or maintain a database of the patrons that visit cinema and then decipher their frequency of viewing? That’s question one. The second question is on the adjacencies that you are focused on. So you have divested out of 4700 BC but in the past you have made multiple attempts not just there but also in say setting up a branded food court.
Your JV with Devyani. So I know you spoke about capital allocation and your intent to penetrate into under screened markets. Further, but from a number two, number three perspective, what are the other priorities of use of cash now that you are able to generate significant amount of free cash flow? Thank you.
Unidentified Speaker
So I’ll answer question one and then I’ll request Gaurav to chip in with the answer for Question two. So in terms of data sharing with the aggregators, we have full access to customer data and customer data at any transaction level. At an individual level we have full access to that information and of course we use it for analytics, you know, various other data driven learnings. What is the proportion of online to box office? Again, business sensitive information. We won’t like to get into specifics but I would say this, that substantial portion of more than 50% of our tickets gets sold through the online channels be it our aggregators or our own digital platforms, the PBR app and the Inox app.
So a substantial portion gets sold through the online channels and data is shared by the aggregators with us. Gaurav, over to you.
Unidentified Speaker
Yeah, thanks Kamal. Just to add Vivek on that, we can also connect separately, you know, and through our investor relations team and give more color offline on that. On your second question around you know, adjacencies in the business and our growth strategy around that, I think first of all I want to make it clear that 4700 BC has been always a non core asset for PVR Inox because it’s a brand, it’s a, it’s, you know, and it scales significantly over time outside the cinemas. It has evolved into multiple channels across, you know, quick Commerce and some of the others.
And more than 85% of its sales comes from non, you know, outside the PVR cinemas. And we have no aspiration nor the expertise to build and scale a nationwide FMCG business. And therefore there was clearly a strategic rationale to exit it however we can. We will continue to retail the products in our cinemas but we will not own the equity in that company. With regard to our joint venture with Devyani on food court side, I think the whole objective is that how we can grow our FNB business, you know, in partnership with other players in the market and you know, given that all our FNB comes from purchase of products over the counter within cinema premises, we felt that there is an adjacency in terms of expanding on the same floor of the mall by moving into a food court where we can partner with other product, other brands and have a pre ticketed FNB kind of business.
That was a vision behind that. And we have already opened three food courts. We are in the process of scaling and opening more but FNB definitely is a big growth driver for us. We have also launched some new brands in food categories where there are Ltd. Other third party brands. For example on Hotdog we have launched a brand called Dogfather which is currently being sold in our cinemas. Similarly on the pizzas, bench fries. And we will continue to nurture them and see if they have potential to scale beyond cinemas as well.
Vivekanand Subbaraman
Okay, thanks Gaurav. Just one small follow up on the second answer. Do you have any budget earmarked for initiatives outside of cinema for let’s say the next couple of years?
Unidentified Speaker
Yes, definitely. We have internally allocated capital towards growing our FNB business which includes building and growing our own brands within the cinemas. But in our overall capex outlay, that’s not a material number as of now.
Vivekanand Subbaraman
All right, thank you. Thank you for the clarity and all the best.
Unidentified Speaker
Thank you.
operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Arul from Bajaj Life Insurance limited. Please go ahead.
Unidentified Participant
Yeah, thank you for the opportunity. This is Sujith Jin from Bajaj Life. So you know when we look at this company, The Pre Covid 2019 Quarterly Average Advertisement income and you can correct me on this number was 146 crore. We’ve not been able to reach their pre code. Occupancy in FY19 was 33%. We are truly appreciative of all the initiatives the company is taking whether it is focal or satellite model, value formats, dine in pilots, etc. But somehow this has not happened. We are still at 28%. So when as investors we think about this company and invest in this company, the pushback that we get from analysts is that perhaps structurally this has changed.
What is it that in your opinion that one can do and will eventually take this industry to the pre Covid highs of occupancy that you achieve then and plus the advertisement income. Thanks.
Unidentified Speaker
On pre Covid versus now. I think the way to look at it and the way we look at this business is that you know, while the occupancy levels have been continuing to, we have seen two successive quarters of 28% occupancy. But you know, financially if you look at the business, we are delivering same EBITDA margins as what we used to do in the pre Covid financial year which is around 18% margin but at a substantially lower occupancy level. So I think from a financial lens the business is generating similar margins and similar return. The return on capital metric is also on an uptrend given the balance sheet strengthening that is happening and pivot towards asset light model will further reduce the capex intensity and strengthen the balance sheet.
So overall return on capital employed in the business is improving and will definitely be in double digits very soon. I think we feel that the trajectory of occupancy is upwards. The kind of films we are seeing for next financial year and next calendar year in fact are much bigger than what we saw last year. Last year we did not have any of the big Khans other than Aamir’s one film. Shah Rukh was not there and Veer Kapoor’s film was not there. But next year we have some of the biggest titles from Hindi film industry and we feel that there is no reason for us to believe that the occupancy levels will be lower than what we have today.
Even Hollywood has a very strong lineup and regional continues to outperform across different languages. So I think from an investor point of view, analyst point of view, the focus should be on operating cash flows, operating margins, return on capital and the balance sheet position. Maybe on the second question on advertisement, I’ll request Gautam to take that one.
Unidentified Speaker
So on advertising, if you see till about H1 we were completely on course and I do understand that Q3 has been a bit of a dampener. I believe that we are on path. It’s just that there has been just so much of chatter around this media that a lot of advertisers have started to now pick film rather than the category because the media perception and the chatter around, you know, people coming to cinemas has grown. So we have a counter plan to this and we are very aggressively working with agencies, our, our media partners and brand managers.
And I think next year would be the pivotal year because we have all the three streams working concurrently which is Hindi film industry, English as well as regional. There is a very strong pipeline and we believe that it could be the turning point along with the fact that, that there’s actually been a lot of work now to see whether we can also make our media more relevant with what the brands are asking. So we have now started to also furnish a lot of data around advertising that is happening at the cinema which is getting huge amount of traction and we hope that we’ll be able to get that confidence back from advertisers and get cinema back in a big way in terms of advertising.
So it’s a journey and I guess we are more than halfway done on that journey. Starting next year, financial year, things would really begin to look up.
Unidentified Participant
What is the ROC that you spent you achieved in nine months as well. Nine months.
Unidentified Speaker
I think we will be in, you know, single digit, in the high single digit number adjusted for goodwill if you look at the overall capital employed.
Unidentified Speaker
So the screener that I use we were at 18% in 2019. FY19.
Unidentified Speaker
Correct. So we are improving. If you look at last year and year before that, the rocs were much lower and the trajectory is upwards.
Unidentified Participant
And one last question is what is the KRA said by the board to the management and does it also include value creation? Because if you see there is. That has been the issue which obviously we discussed as to why there is an issue in terms of some of the glory that we were in the past and now we are scaling back. But what are the exact KRAs of the management sent by the board?
Unidentified Speaker
Yeah, I think the board and the management is focused towards improving the financial profile of the business and you know, the overall leadership level. Deliverables include, you know, revenue, ebitda, overall balance sheet and cash flow as well as some of the qualitative factors around organization, structure, customer experience, which are very critical. So I think those are some of the important things as far as the value piece is concerned. There are multiple factors which affect value financially. I think we are focused on delivering the right results and moving in the right direction and trying to leverage the scale, market share and leadership that PBR INOX has today in the exhibition business to the best of our advantage.
And definitely early signs are visible in the numbers that we have delivered. And on a long term basis we are pretty optimistic about the overall business and performance of the company.
operator
All right, thank you ladies and gentlemen. That was the last question for today. I would now like to hand the conference over to management for closing remarks.
Unidentified Speaker
Thank you so much for everyone to join this call. If there are any more questions, feel free to reach out to our industrial relations team. Thank you.
operator
Thank you on behalf of ICICI Securities. That concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us. And you may now disconnect your lines.