RPG group company, KEC International, is planning to take more of its business overseas, in hunt of more orders.
The capital goods and construction company, which already has presence in almost 40 countries, vows to slowly expand more divisions of its business, to more number of countries.
“We are looking at the whole world as a market. We are already present in the transmission sector in most of the countries. But we plan to take each of our divisions like tower systems, water, railways and telecom to more countries,” said Ramesh Chandak, the managing director and chief executive officer of the company.
KEC, which has already turned its eyes towards overseas orders a while back, has already reaped benefits of the strategy. The company which declared its quarterly earnings yesterday, posted a 15% year-on-year growth of its orderbook which stood at Rs 9,200 crore, even as many other construction companies scrambled for orders.
“This (growth) is unique to KEC. The overall orderbook has improved because of our geographical spread. We already export cables to more than 15 countries and we are getting telecom tower orders from Africa,” said Chandak.
Currently, around 43% of KEC's orders come from India and South East Asia like Bangladesh and others, 18% from the Middle East, 19% from Africa and around 17% from the Americas. The rest comes from Asia Pacific.
The company, whose main business is in transmission orders, is expecting state-owned transmission company, Power Grid to come up with orders which can be as high as Rs 10,000 crore for the industry. Orders from state electricity boards (SEBs), many of which, are under financial stress could be lower, Chandak predicts. “We do not see any payment issues with SEBs. Definitely, there are delays but these businesses work in cycles,” he said.