Tobacco-to-hotels major ITC Ltd yesterday unveiled an impressive showing for 1997-98, clocking a 52 per cent increase in profit after tax, which stood at a hefty Rs 526 crore, up from Rs 347 crore in 1996-97.
The company's turnover also was at a record level of Rs 6834 crore for the year.
The ITC board, which met yesterday to finalise the annual accounts, also recommended a dividend of Rs 4.50 per share, up from the previous year's Rs 4 per share.
The company's foreign exchange inflows were at a healthy Rs 759 crore, about 20 per cent higher than the previous year's Rs 635 crore.
ITC has contributed over $1,575 million in foreign exchange earnings since 1990.
Addressing newspersons after the board meeting, ITC chairman Y C Deveshwar said taking into account the globalising economy, ITC intended to retain its leadership position in all its core businesses _ tobacco and cigarettes, hotels, packaging and printing, speciality paper and international trade.
The company's leaf tobacco exports registered an over 62 per cent growth in value terms and 37 per cent growth in volume terms over the previous year. In the key business of cigarettes, ITC continued to be a market leader in all the segments.
ITC's gross income stood at Rs 6927 crore, up from Rs 5990.60 crore the previous year, duties were at Rs 3759.31 crore, against Rs 3078 crore the previous year.
Net income stood at Rs 3168.06 crore, with total expenditure at Rs 2209.72 crore and interest at Rs 81.01 crore.
Gross profit worked out to Rs 877.33 crore. The figures also show depreciation for the year at Rs 85.85 crore, and a profit before tax of Rs 791.48 crore.
ITC has, from the Rs 526 crore net profit, recommended an addition of Rs 110 crore to the contingency reserve out of unappropriated profits.
This reserve stood at Rs 190 crore in 1997. Rs 200 crore has been recommended for transfer to general reserve. The undistributed surplus amounts to Rs 160.95 crore.
Deveshwar said ITC had decided to accelerate the growth of the Welcomgroup chain by direct investments into this sector apart from concurent investments through its subsidiary ITC Hotels Ltd. In line with this strategy,ITC has acquired from ITC Hotels the Mumbai project, which involves a capital outlay of Rs 450 crore. The ITC flagship hotel, the Maurya Sheraton, Delhi, continues to enjoy a leadership position. ITC Hotels has jointly promoted a chain of heritage hotels under the brand name WelcomHeritage, which already has 10 properties.
He said ITC's printing and packaging business also made significant progress and the goodwill generated by ITC's trademarks are now being leveraged into new product categories. The disengagement of ITC Classic involved a Rs 800 crore outlay.
On the speciality papers business, represented by Tribeni Tissues, he said ITC was in dialogue with several international firms to firm up an alliance to accelerate its development.
