Western Carriers (India) Ltd (NSE: WCIL) Q4 2025 Earnings Call dated May. 19, 2025
Corporate Participants:
Aryan Sumra — Investor Relations Associate
Kanishka Sethia — Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer and Whole Time Director
Amit Agicha — Analyst
Analysts:
Vivek Gupta — Analyst
Isha Murthy — Analyst
Raheel — Analyst
Gunit Singh Narang — Analyst
Rajiv Agrawal — Analyst
Mamita Agarwal — Analyst
Presentation:
Operator
Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to Western Carriers India Limited Q4 and FY ’25 earnings conference call. As a reminder, all participant 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 this conference call, please signal an operator by pressing Star then zero on your touch tone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Aryan Sumra. Thank you. And over to you, sir.
Aryan Sumra — Investor Relations Associate
Thank you, Anshan. Good morning, everyone. Ladies and gentlemen, I welcome you all to the Q4 and FY ’25 earnings conference call for Western Carriers India Limited to discuss this quarter’s full year and business performance. We have from the management, Mr. Kanishka Sethia, CEO, CFO and whole time Director. Before we proceed this call, I would like to mention that some of the statements made in today’s call may be forward-looking and may involve risk and uncertainties. For more details kindly refer to the investor presentation and other filings that can be found on the company’s website. Without further ado, I would like to hand the call over to the management for their opening remarks and then we can open the floor for Q&A. Thank you. And over to you, sir.
Kanishka Sethia — Chief Executive Officer, Chief Financial Officer and Whole Time Director
Thank you so much. Good afternoon, everyone. I am joined by two of my team members Sapna and Ashish on this call. First off, I would like to thank you all for joining us today on this earning calls for our company Western Carriers India Limited. I truly appreciate you taking the time out on this busy Monday morning as we review our performance for the fourth quarter and for the full financial FY ’25. As all of that this marks our third earnings call since listing in late September last year and I would once again like to express my sincere gratitude for your continued trust, interest and support in our journey so far. As all of you would appreciate. And again, FY ’25 has been a year marked by resilience, execution and consolidation. FY ’25 was a year that tested the strength and resilience not only of yours but of the entire sector. All the players, from road carriers to freight consolidators, logistics startups to infrastructure service providers to shippers. All of us have felt the strong economic headwinds together with some regulatory uncertainties and most of all global supply chain disruptions. As the year has progressed, most in the industry were quietly optimistic and forecasted an anticipated turning point. But that relief has really not come in yet and challenges have continued through the year.
In terms of the above mentioned headwinds as you are all aware politics wise, it was a very active year with many major elections at both state and central level. This obviously had a slowdown effect on the growth for the economy, especially from a government spend point of view. However, despite several external headwinds including the ongoing geopolitical disruptions and global trade uncertainties, your company has managed to deliver a stable performance particularly driven by the domestic segment, while also making meaningful progress in strategic areas that position us very well for the future. To set the context, India’s merchandise exports for FY ’25 stood at USD $437.42 billion which is growing marginally by 0.08% from 437.07 billion in the previous year. This flat trajectory reflects the global trade challenges we’ve all been witnessing, including persistent disruptions in international supply chains due to geopolitical conflicts and bottlenecks at key maritime rules. I would like to say that however, the economy now seems to be on a path of positive recovery.
Some of the numbers bear out these facts. India’s GDP expanded 6.2% in quarter three from a seven quarter low of 5.4% in quarter 2. Retail inflation fell to six year low of 3.3% in March. Government spending has also picked up especially in critical infrastructure as well as defense and power. Urban middle class spending is expected to get a boost in FY ’26 after the IT release offered in the Union budget. It’s not all doom and gloom and therefore I think basis all of these facts. I think the industry is looking forward to a period of sustained growth as all the chips are in place so to speak. Obviously as the demand increases so will the need for stronger and more robust supply chain networks than India, and we expect to see more investment and growth in all aspects of supply chain be it rail road, air warehousing, last mile, first mile and value added services. I didn’t talk about international front.
On the international front we are beginning to see some signs of cautious optimism. The prospect of a large scale return of container ships to the Red Sea following ceasefire by U.S. and Houthi Malaysia in Yemen would flood the market with shipping capacity as global TUS per mine demand would decline by about 6% if the ships could sail through Red Sea and the Suez Canal instead of the larger route around Cape of Good Hope in Africa. This could and would dramatically reduce freight ocean freight and this would help the exit trade. However, despite the easing of shipping business, global trade still remains pretty volatile with all the tariff actions across the world led by the U.S. Administration. I don’t think anyone can predict exactly what will happen in the long run and how this will pan out, but the good news is that in the interim, the dust seems to be settling rather quickly as U.S. moves to stitch up important trade deals and partnerships for the next 80 or 90 days or so. We expect therefore to see a short period of volatility in demand probably through the first two quarters of this year, followed by a sustained period of growth as the best settlements.
Again, like I previously said, on the domestic front the environment has been far more favorable. The government’s continued push on critical infra, especially in sectors like defense and power has gained strong momentum. Alongside, we’ve been seeing positive structural shifts such as increasing formalization of the economy, rising e commerce penetration and a growing shift towards multimodal and integrated logistics solutions, which is where your company is targeting. These developments reaffirm the strong growth trajectory for the Indian logistics sector and especially for the specialized logistics sector in which your company participates. Western Carriers has remained at the forefront of all of this transformation. With over five decades of experience, an asset light and scalable model and enduring client relationships, we continue to be the trusted logistics partner for some of India’s most respected industrial houses. We take particular pride in our high customer retention. More than 80% of our revenues are contributed by clients who’ve been with us for over three years. This year we have further reinforced that legacy.
Our order book remains extremely strong and due to long term contracts with major clients we have greater visibility on the same to plan, to implement and to execute. Just to talk about the long term, the growth plan and order books this year has marked several key mega orders for us. one of the biggest highlights continues to be the INR1089 crores four year contract from Vedanta Limited where we manage end to end supply chain for aluminum, Big Iron and EXIM Cargo from their plant in Jagshpura to key ports and hubs around the country. In addition to this ultra large order we’ve received very large, several very large orders including the 170 crores contract from Intustant Zinc and a three year 41 crores project from Tata Steel Limited for the plenty of time without enumerating or going into detail, I would just like to read out some of the orders that we’ve managed to track this year. So, the 41 crores from Tata Steel about putra cracker and polymer contract which came in at about 5.6 crores, we received an order from Tata international for about eight crores, we received an Order for rake movement from international entity in Bhutan called Lucky steel for about 23 crores. We received an order from Vedanta for handling and material handling contract of another 139 crores.
In addition to 1,089 for rail services. We received an order from him to start bringing for 170 crores recently. In the last two weeks we received two large orders. one from Sri Lam Alkali and Chemicals which is a unit of DCM Sriram Limited for container rig tanker rig transportation of CSL to Vedanta order is valued at 23 crores. And the last order which we received around 15th May just a few days ago was a consolidated finished goods Material had been contract from Bharat Armenian company valued at 70 crores. So, this basically is a piece of what we are doing and how because of the large order that we remain extremely strong, our order book remains extremely strong and due to the long term contract with these clients, major clients, we have greater visibility on execution of these. These long term high value commitments not only validate the trust placed in us by our esteemed customers, but also ensures that our revenue visibility enabling us to plan and invest in efficiency boosting infrastructure with much greater confidence. FY ’25, I would like to say in many ways was characterized therefore by these two contrasting trends. A robust momentum in domestic business and persistent challenges in EXIM environment. On the domestic side, our volumes grew by a healthy 31% led by strong demand, particularly for specialized containers.
In response of this extremely strong demand, we procured approximately 300 further FEU’s. Containers aligned with the customer specifications during the year, reinforcing our commitment to customized service delivery. In contrast, EXIM volumes declined by 12% affected by continued congestion at transshipment ports, irregular vessel schedules, geopolitical tensions. These issues also impacted realization due to higher costs and limited space availability. Despite these challenges we are now beginning to see signs of normalization and remain optimistic about a stronger recovery in FY ’26. To support our long term contracts and improve operational agility, we undertook a massive capex this year of approximately 70 crores. This was strategically deployed towards acquiring specialized handling equipment like container reed stackers, forklifts, some commercial vehicles, a lot of specialized containers, all of which are directly aligned with our customer requirement and backed by firm long term orders. It’s pertinent to also look at our business sector wise, which gives a good idea of the value drivers and challenges thereof.
As you know, your company is servicing several varied sectors and verticals and India, as most of the metals industry, which then more than 50% of our businesses, has had a tough year, especially due to geopolitical situations globally impacting theirs and in turn our ex IM business. But with growing domestic demand, most of the impact of this has been softened. However, with geopolitical situation now streamlining to a large extent, there is hope for a period of sustained ex IM growth going forward. The FMCG and pharma industry, which contributes around 25 to 30% of our revenue and demand, has probably a larger effect on our growth plans going forward and this continues to navigate a challenging external environment with another quarter of muted performance. The urban markets are still experiencing sustained slowdown, but the good news is that the rural demand is slowly picking up on the back of very good rains last year.
Again, benign raw material costs for several key components have helped keep the cost of products in check and this should help in creation of further demand. The third sector, the industrial goods and MSME sector, which contributes approximately about 20% of our revenue, is also showing green shoots of growth and with expected good monsoons this year as well as predicted by met, we expect to see increased and reinvigorated demand in this cluster as well. New project launches have been challenging in terms of stretched out timelines compared to the past due to the above mentioned challenges. Whereas in the past many projects were rolled out within 90 to 120 days, we are now seeing something like 120 to 150 day rollout on many projects and in some cases even longer. And that I think remains a challenge not only for us but as the industry as a whole going to I wanted to give you guys a feel of the new rail services and the new projects that we have launched or are in the process of launching as we go ahead financial year.
So, some of the work that we have done and some of the work that is in fruition are the new rail services ex Western India that we started for South Africa north of the country. We expect this to give a huge boost to the MSME business that your company has been steadily growing over the last decade. We’ve already started services in two destinations, one in north and one in South. Destination in the south is Bengaluru and destination in north is Jaipur. We will shortly be starting train freight services in Central India Indore and to another destination in north which is Khad by the end of this month. We also recently like I pointed out, started the first tanker rig movement from Ankleshwar to Lanjigarh for DCM Shriram and this has been done completed successfully and this is expected to constantly go on increasing as the markets go forward. We also have started and done new business development ex Goa and this has started. We expect this business to grow in this financial as well. So, you can see from some of the salient big ticket points that I talked about that there’s a lot of focus on growing business from Western India which is India’s largest production hub and this financial we expect this fits very well with our long term vision, and we expect a lot of focus to continue on the Western India front from our side. We are also getting very long term commitments with large customers. Pan India with two three large contracts and terms in the pipeline which with the grace of hope we hope to be able to announce shortly. Now having talked about the rail services and the new project launches, I would like to turn to our financial performance for the year.
Turning to our financial performance, we have maintained overall stability despite strong external headwinds. Revenue from operations has steadily grown to 1726 crores, up almost 2.4% from 1686 crores in FY ’24. This reflects a very steady performance despite extremely difficult geopolitical situation. I would like to again point out that the domestic volumes has risen sharply by 31% year on year, successfully offsetting the decline in EXIM volumes at 12%. EBITDA came in at a strong INR120 crores with a margin of just south of 7% while PAC stood at 65 crores with a margin of 3.8%. While margins were impacted by pressures in the EX IM segment, they remained within our anticipated range, and we expect margins to improve steadily going forward. In terms of volume, domestic volumes stood at 79840 TEU versus 608633 TUS in FY ’24. This like I said, shows a 31% increase year on year. Meanwhile, the EXIM volumes unfortunately declined to 133635 TEUs from 151,637 TEUs in FY ’24 primarily due to the extremely difficult geopolitical situation.
Looking ahead, we enter FY ’26 with a very strong order book, enhanced operational capacities and renewed optimism. We expect the momentum in the domestic logistics to continue which should buffer us up further. We also expect support from the structural tailwinds that the government is producing on the EXIM front. As global shipping disruptions ease and freight routes stabilizer, we are hopeful of a recovery in volumes and realization. The commissioning of the northern delegated freight corridor is expected towards the end of 2025 and this will be another significant milestone for our country’s infrastructure. This promises to enhance transit speed, lower cost and improve overall logistic efficiencies across the network. Especially for players like us who are well integrated within the rail and multimodal logistics systems. Our strategic priorities remains completely unchanged. Building long term customer relationships, leveraging technology for greater transparency and efficiency, and delivering execution excellence based on one of the top teams in the industry. In closing, I would like to thank the entire western carriers for their resilience, their commitment, their stupendously hard work through a very complex year. I would also like to express my gratitude to all our stakeholders for their continued confidence and support in our journey. Thank you once again for your time, and we would now open the floor.
Questions and Answers:
Operator
Thank you. We will now begin the question and answer session. Anyone who wishes to ask a question may press STAR and one on their touchtone telephone. 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 is from the line of Vivek Gupta from Star Investments. Please go ahead.
Vivek Gupta
Hello. Am I audible?
Operator
Yes, sir.
Kanishka Sethia
Please go ahead. Yeah.
Vivek Gupta
So, my first question was what is the progress on the rollout of your transport management system? Like, what are the benefits have you seen so far?
Kanishka Sethia
Okay, Guptaji. On the transport management system, we’ve been continuously updating our software through the years. We are working on a level of new initiatives in the management system which would give us flexibility and visibility not only in terms of operational excellence, but also would help in improving our financials and our billing cycles further. We have done two or three data launches. We are trying out some of the software and some of the features in the software. We hope most of it to come into fruition in the coming quarter itself. And I think by quarter three we should have whatever updates we want to go completely live. This should help us not only in giving us quicker payrolls and quicker billing cycles, but also at the same time create a large data bank of visibility not only for us, but also for our customers.
Vivek Gupta
Okay. So how many B2B clients are currently active on your platform and how has the engagement trended?
Kanishka Sethia
So, our software, Gupta Ji is piggybacking on our client software. Our business B2B clientele use their own software. We piggyback on them, create the mis and the reports. This is their requirement. We do not have a unique or a unilateral report that we create. So, basis requirement of the customer. We create flexible reports. For example, if a customer needs a daily tracker, we send them a daily tracker. If a customer is satisfied with a weekly tracker, we send them back some customers which are by customers. So, this is the requirement of our customers. We have the capacity to customize the report. And it is the duty of each cad, which is the key account manager, to make sure that the customer gets the data in the format that he requires. Our motto speaks of our legacy, Guptaji. Our motto is delivering trust. And this is what the customer needs to build the trust is the report that we create for them. It’s a very flexible, fungible report. It’s a very simple idiot-proof report, basically talking about whatever documentation, whatever data points that the customer needs. So, if it’s about the location, if it’s about the deliveries, if it’s about the anticipated time of arrival, all of that is covered exactly to the customers requirements.
Vivek Gupta
Okay, one last question from my side. Are you piloting any AI based tools for capacity planning or ETA forecasting? When can we expect these to go live?
Kanishka Sethia
It’s a great question, Guptaji. We’ve actually been working on a couple of modules around AI. We’ve not had great success, to be honest with you, but we continue to work on it. I see a lot of future prospects in AI, especially for our business when it comes to predictive models for warehousing, predictive models for supply chain management, as well as predictive models for religious. So, these are areas of great future hope for us. And we continue to work with our team internally in trying to see how we can optimize the solution which gives us far greater data play in these areas. Thank you. I don’t. Sorry, just to add, I don’t have currently an exact timeline in which we will be able to pilot these AI projects. But it’s something which is in our visibility and our internal teams are working on the software side of this.
Vivek Gupta
Okay, thank you.
Kanishka Sethia
Thank you for your time.
Operator
Thank you. Before we take the next question, we would like to remind the participants to press star and one to ask a question. The next question is from the line of Isha Murthy from IM Capital. Please go ahead.
Isha Murthy
Hello, sir. So, my question to you would be like, could you provide insights into trends in network utilization over the last two quarters? Specifically, how have like major freight corridors performed in terms of load volumes or I can say route efficiency and capacity utilization? So are there any notable improvements or challenges which is being observed across specific lanes or regions?
Kanishka Sethia
Question, ma’am. So, Operations wide operation wise it’s, it’s been a mixed bag year. one area of challenge has been for us around the Vizag Port. There’s been congestion there due to increased volumes. And so, that’s an area of concern not only for us, but for the trade in general. The other routes the eastern corridor has gone by. We have seen good reduction in transit there. The northern dedicated freight corridor about 75%, 80% done. Last time we checked Varnama in Baroda, the northern freight corridor was working. And from Baroda to JNPT the work is going on and going on in full swing. We expect this to be completed by December 2025 or maybe March 26. But once it does, then the more from their customers will have great advantage. And you know, this is something which is going to reduce the transit for the north India customers, especially for the business. So, that gives us a lot of hope going forward in this.
Isha Murthy
Okay. And my second question would be like, what specific steps are being taken to reduce empty mile running and improve the backhaul efficiency overall?
Kanishka Sethia
That’s a wonderful question, ma’am. So, the way we try to reduce empty haulage is that as our volumes are substantially large, we try to create situations of triangulation in which we try to reduce the root haulage as much as possible. For example, if there is a customer who is dispatching materials from Marisa and it is going to Vizag, we have a tracker internally which tells me when the rate will be coming to Vizag and then basis the arrival there. We try to reposition countries and take that from as close as this point. So, the idea is reduce the cycle or the transit to reduce the empty halls because empty halls is a giveaway reduction in profitability and transit. So, it’s something that we spoke of very closely and this is we try to optimize it as much as possible. More you optimize it, the better your results, your return there. Okay?
Isha Murthy
Okay, got it. Thank you.
Kanishka Sethia
Thank you ma’am.
Operator
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Raheel from Crown Capital. Please go ahead.
Raheel
Yes, hi sir, Good afternoon. Just one question if you can let us know your guidance or outlook in terms of revenue growth and EBITDA margins for this year. Financial year 26.
Kanishka Sethia
That’s and you know, basis the situation how we are facing geopolitical uncertainties and domestic situation. With war just having subsided last week, it would be very foolhardy of me to come up With a strong guidance. So, I don’t want to give guidance for the entire year at this time. Maybe if the situation is far more predictable, maybe in the next quarter. I would like to give a guidance, but I would like to say that we expect this to be since we see very good demand in the domestic business, and we are seeing green shoots of growth again in our EXIM business. So, if we can come back to where the exam delivered numbers were in the earlier years, we can consider this, we can predict this to be a stellar year for us.
Raheel
Okay, but if not exact numbers, but then in terms of margins, given the promising demand and the outlook on ground, is there any scope for improvement there?
Kanishka Sethia
Yes, for sure. I can tell you that we expect margins to shoot in this financial year from the current delivered numbers, and we hope to bring the margin slowly back towards the delivered earlier numbers, which was basically what we were able to do based on the exam. And so, we expect the margins to improve steadily through this financial year, to be honest.
Raheel
Okay, sir. Okay. Thank you. And all the best, right sir?
Kanishka Sethia
Thank you sir.
Operator
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Gunit Singh from Counter Cyclical PMS. Please go ahead.
Gunit Singh Narang
Hi sir, my question is regarding the CARE ratings. So, they had issued that the issue is non cooperating for the ratings on our short term and long term boring facilities. So, what is the reason for that?
Kanishka Sethia
So, we have already withdrawn the CARE rating. two companies continues to be with us and our rating is a strong A minus with them. So, that the matter with Chris has already been resorted. We’ve been performing.
Gunit Singh Narang
All right. And sir, year on year in FY ’25 we saw that the share of exports in our total revenues, the TEUs for exports that has dropped year on year. So, looking at the current scenario of higher tariffs and trade wars, do we expect that number to go down further or what visibility do you have from that?
Kanishka Sethia
Fair question, sir. So, you are absolutely right, sir. Like I pointed out in my speech as well, the EXIM number has retracted approximately 12% and I’m talking all numbers in approximate since I don’t have the exact numbers in front of me. So, EXIM numbers have retracted about 12% from I think 1:51,000 last year to about 1:54,000 this year. This is primarily due to the extremely tough geopolitical situation worldwide. And as you would appreciate sir, we are a derived industry. So, when my customers start exporting in large numbers, my exit numbers will also go up.
Now the prospect of large scale return of container ships to the Red Sea, which is expected now, maybe in the next 12 months, would have a huge effect. It’s a 6% decline in the TU per mile. If you go through that route instead of circumnavigating all of Africa and using Cape of Good Hope, what the shipping lines have to do now, that means this could dramatically reduce ocean freight or trade, which would be a strong positive for us. We expect the volumes to go up substantially if this happens. But it’s a wait and watch. As you know, the situation in the Middle East remains quite dynamic. So, it would be very hard for me to predict if it will happen tomorrow or maybe take some time. And I’m very confident that in the short term to medium term this is something that’s going to happen and going to give a good impetus to our EXIM numbers. I don’t see the second part of your question. I don’t see exit numbers reducing any further. I think we’ve reached the bottom and the only way up is for the exit numbers to improve from here.
Gunit Singh Narang
All right, so got it. And so, we saw a 30% jump in the domestic numbers. So, given that there would be a better visibility for the domestic business, what market scenario do we see in this and what visibility do we have? Can we expect the same growth in FY ’26?
Kanishka Sethia
Well, I cannot say if you would have the same growth because this was a stellar year of growth. We grew 31% in domestic from 60,800 containers to about 80,000 containers in this financial year. But yes, I am very confident that we have a very strong growth in domestic primarily based on the utilization of specialized containers for several of our customers. We are stitching up several large projects in this space as well. So, we are fairly very confident that we will have a stellar year in domestic business. We don’t see many headwinds in that. All right, sir.
Gunit Singh Narang
And what were the main drivers of growth in the domestic business? If you can mention like the top 2, three drivers of growth.
Kanishka Sethia
Fair enough, sir. So, one of them was the utilization of specialized containers. I think we procured about 300 FEU’s, which is 40ft containers for specialized movement. This was used primarily in the steel industry for several customers. And this was a business which saw very strong demand, especially in the second half of last financial. This is something that we expect to grow further. The domestic movement has also increased for aluminum, for MSME and for industrials. So, this is something which has been growing and this year we see like I mentioned earlier in my presentation that one of the new rail services or new areas of rail services for the MSME has been from west to south and north so far mostly has changed for the MSME business from west to east. So, now with new geographies that we’ve opened up already in south and north, Bangalore in south, Jaipur in north and shortly in the next couple of weeks we are starting central India within dors. And so, these areas we expect the domestic business to be extremely strong. And also this year started for the first time in a big way that tanker the rate movement for the BC and Sriram group which is moving from west to east, from Ankleswar to Ranjivar, we’ve already done the test runs very successfully completed it earlier this month, and we expect this business to incrementally grow through the year.
Gunit Singh Narang
All right sir. Got it. Sir, do we have any procurement plans of these specialized containers or any capex plans for FY ’26? And if you can enlist that.
Kanishka Sethia
To be honest we are seeing lots of demand, and we are getting long term commitments. Now all of that are enumerated over the last year with a large order that we have gotten 1,089 crores Vedanta order I think is the largest supply chain order in the country. And seeing the long term commitment from our large customers and India and with 2, three large projects and contracts in fruition we feel that it is the last, it’s a good time to actually increase our capex. So, last year I think was the largest capex we’ve ever done in IHC. We closed in on approximately 70 crores of capex last year and my intention this year is to increase it further. We are intending to do a capex of approximately 100 crores in this financial based on the strong demand that we are seeing and this will be, spread across the year and this will again be the largest capex in the history of our company sir.
Gunit Singh Narang
All right sir, go ahead. Thank you very much. Wish you all the best.
Kanishka Sethia
Thank you sir. Thank you for your question.
Operator
Thank you. The next question comes from the line of Rajiv Agrawal from Sterling Capital. Please go ahead.
Rajiv Agrawal
Thank you for the opportunity. I wanted just one data keeping question. Please share me the this quarterly volumes of domestic and EXIM for this quarter and corresponding last quarter.
Operator
Hello.
Rajiv Agrawal
Hello.
Operator
Yes, sir. You’re audible. Just a second.
Kanishka Sethia
Sir, can you just repeat. You wanted the quarter wise volume, right? Quarterly volumes for this quarter for domestic Nexim as compared to corresponding quarter last year. Sure, sure sir. So, I have the quarterly volumes for this year. Unfortunately I don’t have the breakup from last year, but I can give you the Q4 volumes for this year which. Just give me one second. So, yeah, so the Q4 volumes for this year sir is 119824 domestic and 35532 for example. And Q4 ’23. Yes. Q4 ’23 is 15078 for domestic and 38853 for infant. Okay thank you. Right sir. Thank you sir.
Operator
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Amit Agicha from HG Hawa. Please go ahead.
Amit Agicha
Yeah. Good afternoon sir. Am I audible?
Kanishka Sethia
Good afternoon.
Amit Agicha
Thank you for the opportunity sir, most of my questions have been answered so like just I want to know the IPO raised amount was 492 crores. Like is that completely utilized or from left for using capex?
Kanishka Sethia
Sir, we have not utilized all of it sir. We have utilized a substantial portion of it sir and till date we have about 156 crores still with us which will go into the capex that I was talking about. Part of it will go into capex. So, about 156 crores is still at us sir. Out of the 400 crores.
Amit Agicha
Thank you for the information, sir. And sir, different questions like any one key insight like which we have discovered in the past three years like which is very unique, you must have understood for the business.
Kanishka Sethia
I follow you sir. Can you please repeat?
Amit Agicha
Yeah sir, any key insight like which you must have discovered in the past three years which is very unique to our business.
Kanishka Sethia
That’s a great question sir. So, one of the key insights has been that given the difficult EXIM situation in the last couple of years we’ve been working very hard in trying to grow our business domestically, and we found that customers have become more and more inclined towards multimodal logistics. Especially after the COVID times and people are more and more focused on finding solutions or solution providers like us who can do the entire supply chain work. I would say 5, 7, 10 years ago people were doing logistics in a segmented way. They had a railway freight forwarder, a road transporter, a cha etc. Etc. But now that the consolidated CPS4PL opportunity that people are seeing benefit of it’s been a real revelation for us, and we see that going forward also multimodal logistics solution is something which will incrementally keep going as we go forward. Sir, if I Remember correctly, a lot of research reports have pointed out that the growth from multimodal logistics is supposed to be very steep going forward also, sir. And it is an area of great opportunity. So, according to the one Lattice report, multimodal, that is the space that we work in terms of rail and road market in India, was valued at about 1,714 billion in FY ’24. And this is projected to grow to 466 billion by FY ’29. That means we are expecting a CAGR of 22%. And if your company, which is the largest in the space, can remain dedicated and focus on the opportunity, you can see the opportunity which remains in front of us. And the government projects like the dedicated state corridor, the multimodal logistics park, the Gati Shakti Yojana, these are all perfectly aligned with what we are doing, sir. So, I am expecting that once international political turbulences subside, we should be for a very strong right going forward.
Amit Agicha
Sir, thank you for the elaborate answers. I really appreciate the answer. And all the best for the future. Thank you.
Kanishka Sethia
Thank you so much, sir. Thank you.
Operator
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Mamita Agarwal from AGS Investments. Please go ahead.
Mamita Agarwal
Hi. Thank you for the opportunity. So, my first question is what specific elements of operational expenditure contribute most to the margin pressure? And this and these are expected to persist in the coming quarters. Hello.
Kanishka Sethia
So, ma’am, the major operational expenditure for us, if we look at it in two parts, for the rail business is always the rail side and for the road business is always. Or the road component of the business is diesel. I’m happy to say that for the road component, which is the first mile and the last mile, diesel prices have remained more or less flatlined for the last year or so. So, there’s not been much of a pressure and increase in that. And rail freight also has remained more or less stable over the last year. And so, we don’t expect it to really, in the short run change dramatically from here. So, the operational costs of these two components are more or less fixed in the short term.
Mamita Agarwal
Okay great. So, my second question is what cost realization or like efficiency improvement initiative are we taking.
Kanishka Sethia
Ma’am, I’m not able to follow you. Can you repeat that?
Mamita Agarwal
Hello? Am I audible now?
Kanishka Sethia
Yeah, you’re audible, ma’am. Can you repeat that?
Mamita Agarwal
Sure. So, my question is, like, what cost realization or efficiency improvement initiative are we taking to protect our margins?
Kanishka Sethia
Okay. So, for improving our realization, what is important is that we Run an extremely tight and strong supply chain. Our goal is always, like I pointed out earlier, to reduce empty halls. Our goal is always to reduce the turnaround time of our assets. And our goal is always to create a very streamlined supply chain where we are not increasing our cost of operation and at the same time improving our efficiency. This could be either in terms of asset utilization or smarter man management. For example, if you are able to do two jobs instead of 1, since we work in an entire supply chain, if you take care of two jobs instead of having two people, I can pay you better salary but at the same time save the cost of an increased manpower. Our idea always is to give the growth opportunity to our team as well as streamline our operations as much as possible Because that’s where the margins improve.
Mamita Agarwal
Okay sir, one more question. Like our other income increased significantly to 4.8 crores from 1.5 crores year on year. So, what contribute to this growth? Like was it treasury gains incentives or some other one offs?
Kanishka Sethia
So, this is basically the IPO money bank which you know, within the bank. So, that’s the it’s under heavy as for the norms and that is what we are earning on. So, like currently like I pointed out previously, we have about 156 crores in line with us from the IPO money which we have not used and that’s all lying with bank. And so, we have an FTA on that. That’s what the other income is, ma’am.
Mamita Agarwal
Okay, okay. Given the margin pressure. So, how is our receivable cycle trending? Like what is our current working capital days and are we taking any steps to reduce it?
Kanishka Sethia
We’re taking lots of steps, ma’am. The working capital cycle has been long primarily because we’ve added substantial new businesses that I earlier. And so, the payment cycle becomes long whenever we launch new projects. As I said, the new project launches. I also pointed out in our presentations has been a challenging time because of the stretched out timelines compared to the past where in the past we rolled out projects successfully in 90 to 120 days. We are now seeing something like 120 to 150 day rollout on many projects and some are even longer. And this is industry wide. It is not only for us and I think this remains a challenge, but this is something which now we are seeing signs of reduction back to where we are. So, we are hoping that you know, our working capital cycle should start streamlining quite effectively in this year.
Mamita Agarwal
Okay sir, just one last question. So, do you anticipate the EBITDA and SAT margin recovery in Q1 FY ’26 and IF.
Kanishka Sethia
Absolutely, Ma’am. Absolutely ma’am. We expect margins to improve steadily through this financial year. And we expect overall improvement not only in EBITDA but also in the PAC numbers. And we expect our working capital cycle also to substantially improve in FY ’26. As a lot of these projects have gone to. They have gone from launch into implementation. We expect the payment cycles to improve dramatically. So, we expect margins to be much better and going towards where we were earlier.
Mamita Agarwal
Okay, sir, Are we expecting this improvement because of pricing, cost control or some volume push like if you can give some clarity on this also.
Kanishka Sethia
So, the per unit margins remains the same. But you are absolutely right that the further the volumes are and the better the efficiencies are, the margins will improve. Say for example, let me give you an example of a forklift. Say if the current volume is 3,000 containers, then I’m doing 100 trips of the forklift. Now if it increases from 3,000 to say 3,300, that means there is a 10% increase in the throughput of the asset. But my asset cost remains the same. Right? So ceteris paribus, that means that should give me an incremental increase in my margin. You do this over operations, over assets, over location and that is where the margin starts improving. So, the idea is not only to sweat your assets but to plan your logistics supply chain in such a way that you get the best results out of what you are doing with the focus always remaining on customer design. If I am able to solve my customer’s problem and give him a benefit, that incremental benefit to me, always accuse.
Mamita Agarwal
Okay, okay. That’s great. Thank you so much, sir.
Kanishka Sethia
Thank you ma’am. Thank you for your question.
Operator
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen. We will take that as the last question. I would now like to hand the conference over to Mr. Aryan Sumra for closing comments.
Aryan Sumra
I would like to thank the management for taking the time out for today’s conference call. And also I would like to thank the participants for joining the call. If you have any further queries, please feel free to contact us. We are MUFG in time India Private Limited Investor Relations Advisors for Western Carriers India Limited. Thank you so much.
Operator
Thank you. On behalf of Western Carriers India Limited. That concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us. And you may now disconnect your lines.