AI assistant
Premier Energies Limited Call Transcript 2026
59480_rns_2026-05-20_14e3f5ce-f860-45be-8094-b8db7bd12807.pdf
Call Transcript
Open in viewerOpens in your device viewer
Premier Energies
Ref: PEL 19/2026-27
Date: May 20, 2026
To
The Secretary
BSE Limited
Phiroze Jeejeebhoy Towers,
Dalal Street,
Mumbai - 400001
Scrip Code: 544238
To
The Manager,
Listing Department
National Stock Exchange of India Limited
Exchange Plaza, C-1, G Block, Bandra-Kurla
Complex, Bandra (East), Mumbai – 400 051
Trading Symbol: PREMIERENE
Dear Sir/Madam,
Subject: Transcript of the conference call on financial results for the quarter and year ended on March 31, 2026.
In accordance with Regulation 30 of the SEBI (Listing Obligations and Disclosure Requirements) Regulations, 2015, we are enclosing herewith the transcript of the conference call discussing the financial results for the quarter and year ended on March 31, 2026. This call took place at 18:30 hours IST on Friday, 15th May, 2026.
The above information will be made available on the website of the Company.
This is for your information and records.
Thanks & Regards,
For Premier Energies Limited
HITESH
KUMAR JAIN
Digitally signed by HITESH KUMAR JAIN
Date: 2026.05.20
17:31:42 +05'30'
Hitesh Kumar Jain
Company Secretary and Compliance Officer
PREMIER ENERGIES LIMITED
Corporate Office 8th Floor, Orbit Tower 1
83/1 Hyderabad Knowledge City, TSIIC Raidurgam
Hyderabad 500081, Telangana, India
Registered Office 8/B/1 & 2, E-City (Fab City)
Maheshwaram Mandal, Raviryala Village
Ranga Reddy District 501359, Telangana, India
CIN L40106TG1995PLC019909 | +91.94.9016.7793 | [email protected] | www.premierenergies.com
Page 1 of 15
"Premier Energies Limited
Q4 FY26 Earnings Conference Call"
May 15, 2026
MANAGEMENT: MR. CHIRANJEEV SINGH SALUJA – MANAGING
DIRECTOR – PREMIER ENERGIES LIMITED
MR. NAND KISHORE KHANDELWAL – CHIEF
FINANCIAL OFFICER – PREMIER ENERGIES LIMITED
MR. VINAY RUSTAGI – CHIEF BUSINESS OFFICER –
PREMIER ENERGIES LIMITED
MR. SUDHIR REDDY – CHIEF STRATEGY OFFICER –
PREMIER ENERGIES LIMITED
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
Moderator:
Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to the Premier Energies Limited Q4 FY26 Earnings Conference call hosted by ICICI Securities Limited. 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 the conference call, please signal an operator by pressing star then zero on your touchtone phone. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Mohit Kumar from ICICI Securities Limited. Thank you and over to you, sir.
Mohit Kumar:
Thank you, Rutuja. Good evening. On behalf of ICICI Securities, I welcome you all to the Q4 FY26 Earnings call of Premier Energies. Today, we have with us from the management Mr. Chiranjeev Singh Saluja, Managing Director; Mr. Nand Kishore Khandelwal, Chief Financial Officer; Mr. Vinay Rustagi, Chief Business Officer and Mr. Sudhir Reddy, Chief Strategy Officer.
We will begin with the opening remarks from the management, which will be followed by Q&A. Thank you and over to you, sir.
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
Thank you, Mohit. Am I audible?
Moderator:
Yes, you are. Please go ahead.
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
Good evening, everyone. Thank you for joining us today for our Full year FY2026 Earnings call. I am Chiranjeev Saluja, Managing Director of Premier Energies and I am joined today by my colleagues Mr. NK Khandelwal, Group CFO; Sudhir Reddy, Chief Strategy Officer and Director and Vinay Rustagi, Chief Business Officer.
I am delighted to share that the company has reported a record set of revenue and profit numbers. Our total revenue has increased by 20.7% year-on-year to INR8,026 crores. The profitability margins have held steady; operational EBITDA margin is reported at 30.4% and PAT margin at 18.8%.
Our PAT has jumped 61.1% year-on-year to INR1,510 crores. The most pleasing thing about these numbers is that they have been achieved in a challenging overall environment with increase in several commodity prices and freight prices. Amongst key business updates, we recently completed construction of our 5.6 gigawatt module plant at Sitarampur in Telangana.
This is one of the largest and most automated module plants in India and is expected to achieve full ramp-up in the next 2 months. In the last few months, we launched two new products Zero Busbar cells and All-Black modules responding to an evolving market. These two products the requirements are showing a strong technical expertise.
These innovations are already receiving great market acceptance. Our manufacturing plants continue to run at near peak capacity utilization and our TOPCon cell line, which was commissioned in June 2025, was stabilized in record time and is now running at 90% plus levels.
Our proposed acquisition of 51% stake in Transcon is complete. Transcon has reported excellent results with annual revenue and PAT of INR423 crores and INR45 crores respectively. EBITDA and PAT margins have jumped sharply over previous years to 19.1% and 10.6% respectively.
Page 2 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
The company is now embarking on major growth trajectory with total capacity set to increase nearly sevenfold to 16.75 GVA by July 2026 with focus on more lucrative HV and EHV segments. As we look forward to the new year, the environment around us is becoming ever more unpredictable.
But our investments in scale, technology, people and supplier relationships built over a 30-year operating platform are paying off in building a resilient business with profitable growth. The Middle East crisis is turning into a pivotal moment for renewables as all stakeholders look to rethink energy mix and reduce consumption of fossil fuels.
We believe this is going to provide a major boost to long-term demand for the sector. We are already seeing strong demand traction across all segments. New installations in FY26 grew to almost 45 gigwatt in AC terms, a fantastic 87% growth over FY25, with estimated total module demand of close to 60 gigawatt.
The momentum is expected to carry through into the current year, and I emphasize, notwithstanding concerns around tendering slowdown and transmission delays. This is reflected in our growth order book, which currently stands at INR14,010 crores, up 66% year-on-year.
We are primed to capitalize on the booming solar opportunity with our expanded module capacity of 11.1 gigawatt and cell capacity going up to 10.6 gigawatt shortly. These capacities make us one of India's largest and most integrated cell and module manufacturer. FY27 is a year of large capex for us at INR5,100 crores to be deployed across cells, ingot wafers, batteries and inverters.
Helping us to transform our business with a diversified portfolio of clean energy equipment. At the same time, a major endeavour of the company is to leverage AI and digital technologies, automate day-to-day tasks, exploit process efficiency and boost productivity to stay competitive in an evolving marketplace. With all these initiatives, we hope to maintain our leadership position as the lowest cost producer of best-in-class products for the foreseeable future. Thank you. We are now open for questions.
Moderator:
Thank you very much. We will now begin the question-and-answer session. The first question is from the line of Praveen Sahay from Prabhudas Lilladher. Please go ahead.
Praveen Sahay:
Yeah, thank you for the opportunity and many congratulations for a good set of numbers. My first question is related to the module. If you can clarify, like the total Q4, the DCR module volume as a percentage of a total volume has sequentially doubled?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
It's been clearly the same.
Praveen Sahay:
Because if I look at the DCR website, it's showing that the production of the DCR module for you has been doubled on the sequential basis. So as the case for you, like can you clarify that?
Vinay Rustagi:
So in the last quarterly call also we had said that the DCR website is more a verification portal for traceability and for DCR verification. It is not a portal to arrive at numbers of sales of module or cells. So the number there may not be an accurate number.
Page 3 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja: Yeah, maybe you know, just to add to that Praveen. Our sales mix between selling cells and DCR modules, it changes on a quarter-to-quarter basis. And we have an order book comprising both—hello, can you hear us?
Praveen Sahay: Yes. Please go ahead.
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja: Okay. And a sale order book comprises both cells, DCR modules and non-DCR modules. But I don't think you should read too much into the quarterly changes in this mix.
Praveen Sahay: Okay. Second on the cell realization or the external cells revenue, if you can give some indication that sequentially how it is shaping, because you have a higher order of a cell now in the order book. So how the realization is shaping up on the sequential basis?
Vinay Rustagi: So in terms of the cell market, you know, the cell market overall still continues to be favourable. The pricing has been quite stable at between 13.5 to 14 US cents and we don't see any change in pricing in the current environment.
Praveen Sahay: Okay. Yeah, thank you, sir. That's it.
Moderator: Thank you. The next question is from the line of Aditya Vikhram from DB Securities. Please go ahead.
Aditya Vikhram: Hi, sir. Two quick questions. First of all, there is a significant increase in purchase of stock. Could you clarify why is that the case, because it's approximately four times of last year? Is that helping us with the margins?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja: Hi. The stock going up is a planned move by us looking at the supply chain situation and also the new 5.6 gigawatt of module line which has got commissioned, which also requires more stock to be purchased for the module line. So it's well in line with our plans. There is no major increase.
Aditya Vikhram: Okay. And there is also a net debt increase of approximately INR660 crores. Why is that?
Vinay Rustagi: So that is inevitable because we are embarking on a large capex program. You know our total capex for the cell line of 7 gigawat alone is about INR3,000 crores. And then in addition to that, we have already started work on our ingot wafer project and separately on other projects including aluminium line, aluminium frames, battery storage and of course, transformers as well.
So I think you will see, as we have previously said, we have about a INR12,000 crores capex plan spread over 3 years starting FY26. And as the capex goes up, we are funding it through a mix of internal accruals and debt and the debt level will inevitably go up as well. We are obviously -- sorry, please go on.
Aditya Vikhram: No, sorry, just to add there. I know you have clarified this on previous calls as well, but what is the debt-to-equity ratio which you are looking at or targeting?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja: Sorry, please repeat that question.
Page 4 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
Aditya Vikhram:
So what is the debt-to-equity considering all the expansions which are in place and which we are planning as a company? What is the debt-to-equity ratio you are looking at in next 1 or 2 years?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
So through this capex cycle our endeavour is to maintain our A plus rating and we want to maintain the debt-to-equity ratio at about 1 and debt-to-EBITDA ratio at about 1.5 or below.
Aditya Vikhram:
Okay. And last and final thing, so we have somehow sustained margins when other peers in the same group are not able to because of copper prices, silver prices increase. It clearly looks like that this time the in-stock trades have helped us. How are you seeing the margin trajectory in this upcoming quarter? Again, silver prices and copper prices have started going up and there is all the war escalations and everything which is happening. So how do you see this sustaining at this level?
Vinay Rustagi:
Yeah, I mean we can't give you any guidance on margin. We as a company, we don't give any futuristic, we don't make any futuristic statements. But our current order book is priced at levels which are consistent with what we saw in the last year. Yes, some costs are going up, but at the same time we are also doing a lot of work behind the scenes to be able to reduce our cost and improve the efficiencies in the overall business.
We also need to understand that the scale of the business has grown by almost 2x in the last 1 year and is going to grow by something like 2x to 3x over the next year as all the new plants come online and our production kind of picks up. So the result of this is we are building significant operating leverage in the business, which is going to give us the advantage of efficiency in reduction of the fixed cost base.
The procurement cost should come down as scale goes up. So I think the result of all these things is that yes, some costs are going up, but we believe that we are in a very good shape to be able to absorb some of these cost increases and stay profitable. What happens to the exact margins obviously depends on a number of factors, many of which are outside our control.
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
And just to add to what Vinay said, there is a favourable shift in the business. There is more DCR modules coming up as the demand increases, plus there is a policy shift towards ALMM-3, which is an advantage for leading players with strong balance sheets. So as Vinay said, apart from this, our scale, procurement efficiencies, low cost base, we believe it will help us maintain industry-leading margins.
Aditya Vikhram:
Okay. Thank you very much.
Moderator:
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Nidhi Shah from ICICI Securities. Please go ahead.
Nidhi Shah:
Hi. Thank you so much for taking my questions. So my first question is on exports. We've seen that exports have sort of never really been the focus for the company because of domestic demand. And now that the tariffs on tax plus the anti-dumping duties on India are very high, are we looking to export to the US at all by procuring cells from Africa or anything like that?
Page 5 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
So Nidhi, we are looking at -- if you look at our presentation, we feel there's a strong potential of exports to Europe and US both. We are seeing that the demand in Europe will really pick up after the FTA is in place. And even for the US, we are looking at more on cell manufacturing. We had earlier announced our cell manufacturing plans in the US and we are looking at it positively now because things have settled down. And we feel that there is still a good opportunity for exports and we will look at the right opportunity to start exports to the US.
Nidhi Shah:
All right. And since ALMM-2 is coming up, applicability in June when do we expect realistically that demand driven purely by ALMM-2 should actually start picking up through grandfathered projects?
Vinay Rustagi:
So Nidhi, I mean when it comes to ALMM-2, we need to understand that there are various market segments with different rules applying to them in terms of application of ALMM-2. The private market both rooftop and open access projects for C&I customers, ALMM-2 becomes applicable from June 1 and the demand is expected to come online to come to the market immediately.
And that by the way is a very substantial demand because now the C&I segment is almost equal in size to the utility-scale segment. So we expect from June 1 onwards the entire market, the entire solar sector except for utility-scale segment to shift towards ALMM-2 or domestic cells.
And then when it comes to the utility-scale market, the demand is going to come, I would say, towards the end of FY28 and 29 onwards because there are all these old projects which had been auctioned before September 25. They have been grandfathered and they can still use imported cells.
But if you look at the overall market demand mix, you know, if we look at what we did in the last year, out of 45 gigawatt, 30 gigawatt including rooftop, KUSUM and C&I is switching onto the domestic cells right now and only 15 gigawatt will be remaining for the utility-scale market for FY28 and beyond. So a bulk of the market shifts to domestic cells immediately now.
Nidhi Shah:
All right. My last question would be on K-Solar. So the company recently announced that we will not be acquiring K-Solar anymore. So could you let us know why that was firstly and second that do we have other companies in mind for inorganic growth or is there something now that we're looking to build this piece on our own?
Vinay Rustagi:
Yeah, so in terms of K-Solar, look this was a non-binding term sheet at that time and the final documentation still had to be completed. Obviously, there is a very comprehensive set of documents for any transaction of this kind and unfortunately we could not find an agreement on some of these terms and conditions in the set of documents.
I think that is the reason why the transaction could not be completed. In terms of our future plans, we remain totally committed to the inverter business and indeed are working right now to expedite our plans. We are looking at strategic options in terms of JV partner. We have a proposed JV with SMA SGS and that JV remains our first preference and we are looking at other strategic options as well and we will finalize this over the next few months.
Page 6 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
Nidhi Shah:
All right. Thank you so much.
Moderator:
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Kunal Shah from DAM Capital. Please go ahead.
Kunal Shah:
Yeah, hi sir. Congratulations on a very good set of numbers first of all. So firstly we've been able to maintain our gross margins at a stable level versus most of our peers seeing a very sharp decline in that sense. Could you just throw some insights on our execution and how are we managing this cost inflation which is ongoing?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
So Kunal, I think one of the significant things which you see is utilizations of our cell lines. So we have been able to ramp up and utilize our cell lines at optimum level and that is one of the key reasons that we've been able to have the right DCR mix. Do you want to add something, Vinay?
Vinay Rustagi:
No, I think Kunal this is a question we already tried to answer earlier. Yes, there's been an increase in some of the costs, but as the scale of the business goes up, we are also seeing a significant amount of operating leverage and efficiency coming into the business. We are actually doing a lot of work to optimize our operations, increase automation, use all the digital technologies etcetera to reduce our cost base. And I think what you see in terms of the results is basically a mix of some of these costs going up, but us being able to reduce costs on some of the other areas of operations helping us to maintain our margins.
Kunal Shah:
Understood. Just a follow-up on this now, given like the 7 gigawatt line is going to come on stream anytime soon, right, in the next 3 months, 4 months. Now, do you see like as you ramp up the line these cost optimization will continue and if you can just quantify that and second on the 7 gigawatt line, would there be like a front-ended capex wherein you can do further Brownfield at a lower cost and what would be the optionality of that capex?
Vinay Rustagi:
Yeah, sure. So I think I mean definitely 7 gigawatt is basically trebling our current capacity, all in a single line, single site. So there will definitely be many more efficiencies coming into the business. Just to give you an idea, we currently have four different module plants spread across Fab City and the new Sitarampur plant that we've just commenced operations in uses 40% less manpower on a per megawatt basis.
So that is the kind of advantage that we're seeing in reducing our cost base. In relation to a potential for Brownfield site, yes, I mean, I think that is definitely a real possibility for us. We have the land and the additional infrastructure available for doing an almost parallel 7 gigawatt new cell line with a capex cost efficiency of as much as 30% to 40%. So bearing in mind that our capex for the first 7 gigawatt line is already at about 35% lower than the industry benchmark, that gives us a major advantage in terms of cost and in an ability to scale up and build this line in a very quick time, assuming that the demand takes off.
Kunal Shah:
Understood. This is very helpful, sir. Secondly, in terms of the existing order book of INR14,000 odd crores, how should we think of the execution timelines of the same like the conversion to revenue on this? And sir, a follow-up here would be what, I mean, we know that you don't give a precise guidance, but the FY26 order inflows have been extremely strong for the company.
Page 7 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
Like, are we confident to grow on the order inflows for FY27 as well? Are you seeing that market shaping up in that sense?
Vinay Rustagi: Yeah, so Kunal, the execution of the order book, most of this will happen in FY27. I can't give you an exact number, but it will be, I would say more than two-thirds. And in relation to new order intake for the year, I think like we've said earlier there is a very strong demand momentum in the sector.
And in fact, we are going to see a surge in particularly, I would say, DCR order intake as we go forward because a large part of the market has been sitting on placing new orders in anticipation of hoping for an ALMM-2 extension. But we believe that the policy is here to stay and there will be no further extension. As and when, we approach June 1 and that kind of decision line becomes clear, we will see I would say, a big rush for orders. And I think FY27 should be equally good for the order intake for us and for the industry.
Kunal Shah: Understood. Thirdly sir on the resolution fund raising resolution is INR5,000 crores now. Could you just help with the rationale for the same and how are we contemplating on the potential capital allocation like what are the areas that came out?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja: Kunal this was an enabling resolution. We had taken this approval from our board. There is no plan for any QIB or fund raise immediately. As I told you we are looking at opportunities in Europe, in US. As and when we see that there is an opportunity and we need to do a fund raise we will of course intimate as of now there is no plan. It was just an enabling resolution.
Kunal Shah: Understood. And last one, bookkeeping. There's this sharp increase of inventory, I mean, your working capital getting blocked. And now, could you help like is it because like we're building up the stock ahead of the module line coming up or like could you just explain the rationale?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja: It's for two reasons. One is building up stock ahead of the module line and also because of the Middle East crisis that we've stocked up, we planned these inventory levels and stocked up raw material.
Kunal Shah: Understood. This is extremely helpful, sir. All the best for the future and I'll fall back in the queue. Thank you.
Moderator: Thank you. The next question is from the line of Naman Jain from Kotak Institutional Equities. Please go ahead.
Naman Jain: Hello. Am I audible?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja: Yes, Naman.
Naman Jain: Yeah. My question is primarily on the BESS business since it's the future is solar plus BESS and there have been multiple reports that the government's going to push for a 50% plus localization in BESS going forward, right? So seems like more of an ALMM moment for modules. So why and since the capex intensity is pretty low, especially for containerized BESS solution where we are not doing cells anymore.
Page 8 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
Why are we not pushing for a, let's say, a 12 gigawatt hour capacity by March 2027 itself? Because given the asset turns going be very high, so might be -- you might be one of the earlier players in the field and make up most of the profitability in this space in FY28?
Vinay Rustagi:
Yeah, sure. Sure. I mean, I think Naman, you would have noted if you're following the government announcements and the likely shape of the policy, any localization roadmap is likely to become effective only by around FY28 or so. And as we speak, there is -- the industry is primarily basically relying on imports from China on which there is no constraint right now and the duty level also remains quite low at about 11%. So I think over the next 1 to 2 years, we will still continue to see a big portion of the demand being met from imports, and that is why we've decided to basically pace our capacity addition program for this business.
Naman Jain:
Got it. And secondly since we have been able to create sort of a capability where we can expand cell capacity quickly and as well as at a lower capex, how sure are we in achieving the 7 gigawatt capacities as in, it sort of indicates that we'll be able to do it in the half year, which will probably make you the largest player in cell, right? So do we see any delays or it's sort of like we really believe that it's going to happen? And what's your expected timeline for stabilization after that?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
So Naman, we had even said the same thing in our last earnings call that it's on track. And if you look at our presentation, the 7 gigawatt plant, 4.8 June and 2.2 September is on track. It takes 4 to 6 months for stabilizing these lines and as we speak, everything is on track. We don't see any significant delays.
Naman Jain:
Got it. Yeah, that's it from my side. Thank you.
Moderator:
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Abhishek Nigam from Motilal Oswal. Please go ahead.
Abhishek Nigam:
Yeah, hi. Thank you so much for the opportunity and congratulations on a very good result despite all the volatility. Just on -- in the presentation there is one slide on global opportunity. So I was just wondering if you are able to give a little more details in terms of specifically is there something that you are looking for, either in module, cell, battery, any specific geographies that you prefer over others? So any thoughts over there that's my first question?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
So Abhishek, on solar cells we had announced our JV with Heliene. We had put it on a pause. We have reinitiated discussions now. We have also started looking for sites. So we are serious on our US solar cell plans. On Europe, we are seeing a great opportunity. The demand is about 80 gigawatt there per annum. There's also a mandate in EU for solar cells, for inverters. So we are evaluating all these opportunities and as and when we are close to finalizing, we would update the markets.
Abhishek Nigam:
Okay. Okay. Fair enough. I understand. And second on the battery side, so you know, everybody is doing capex. I see you are doing capex and Waaree is doing and others who are also sort of in the fray. Markets have expected a localization policy for a while, but off late there has not been much from the government or from the ministry. So is there anything you would update us on what is happening over there and if you expect a localization policy, could it be first half of this year, second half of this year? Anything you have over there?
Page 9 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
Vinay Rustagi:
Yeah, sure Abhishek. So we feel that the government is completely committed to local manufacturing for batteries. In fact, batteries and all the other clean energy equipment, be it wind turbines, electrolyzers and all the other pieces of equipment over a period of time. With batteries, I think the government has been slightly conservative given that it's a nascent market and there is a large need for batteries in the short run.
There's more than 50 gigawatt hour of auctions which have been completed, which have been done at very, very competitive prices. Also given what the government and the market experience has been for ALMM for solar, the government is planning to give about a 2-year timeline to the industry to prepare itself.
We feel the government is very committed to this. They've already held industry consultations and the thought process is very, very consistent with what we have seen in ALMM-2 and ALMM-3. And we would expect the policy to be announced, I mean it's very difficult to give exact indicators for government initiatives, but it could be announced anytime over the next 3 months to 4 months.
Abhishek Nigam:
Okay. That's very useful. Thank you so much. I will come back in the queue.
Vinay Rustagi:
Thanks, Abhishek.
Moderator:
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Ketan Jain from Avendus Spark. Please go ahead.
Ketan Jain:
Thank you. Good evening, sir. Congratulations on a very good set of numbers. I just had a follow-up question from a previous participant. I understand we've been able to retain our margins and that is really appreciable. But how has the price cost moved from January till now? The bill of module, bill of materials for modules, how has it moved in terms of cents per watt?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
So you're talking about DCR modules or you're talking about non-DCR modules?
Ketan Jain:
Both, sir. Just the bill of material, how has it increased? How has the cost increased?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
So on non-DCR modules, we have seen cell prices rising in China. They have gone up from 3.5 cents level to almost 6, 6.2 cents. So it's like almost a 80%, 90% increase on cells. But since it's a pass-through to the customers, module prices would go up in line with China prices. And if you talk of DCR modules, because of scale, efficiencies and the mix which is changing, so we have been able to maintain our margins.
And we are quite confident that going forward long-term margin trends should be stable and likely even better because the mix is changing. What you need to understand is that the non-DCR modules are gradually going to be phasing out and more of made-in-India DCR mix is going to be brought in as the IPPs also start buying DCR modules. And we are quite confident that with scale and procurement efficiencies, we will be able to maintain healthy margins.
Ketan Jain:
Is there any increase in the bill of material as well, apart from cells, in the costing?
Page 10 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
So for glass, there has been no increase because of the minimum import price. For aluminium, we have seen around 11% of the module cost is aluminium. There has been slight increase, but again with design changes and frame size optimization, we've been able to mitigate those increase of aluminium. So it's not been significant.
Ketan Jain:
Understood. Sir, as you mentioned, there have been a healthy sales mix. I think around FY25, we would have had around 60% of non-DCR and around 40% of DCR. Do we maintain the same for FY26? Did we have the same mix?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
So we never gave the FY25 numbers, but going forward, I can give you an indication that every quarter DCR mix is going to increase.
Ketan Jain:
Okay. Understood, sir. Thank you and all the best. I will get back in the queue.
Moderator:
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Prakhar Porwal from Ambit Capital. Please go ahead.
Prakhar Porwal:
Thank you, sir, for the opportunity. Just one question again a follow-up to the previous participant's question. We talked on DCR, non-DCR modules. On cells, in the last call you mentioned two levers of cost saving. One is silver reduction in your solar cell and second is hedging that we do for 6 months.
So one first question is on hedging, what is the policy right now because given since last 6 months silver prices have remained elevated? So is the cost increasing on that front? Second, given you filed on the BSE as well about Zero Busbar cells, so maybe just some clarity what could be approximate reduction in silver consumption because of that, because we have not heard of Zero Busbar from anyone, any breakthroughs that globally you are seeing in terms of reducing silver which maybe we can also do in coming quarters?
Vinay Rustagi:
Yes, hi Prakhar. So on silver, we had extensive discussions in the last call also. And we maintain sufficient stock at any given point of time and obviously also undertake hedging as we said last time. The other thing what we have started doing now is that we have started passing the silver cost risk to our customers in all the new orders that we are signing.
So as a result of all these initiatives, we are not affected by silver cost increases going forward, I would say. Second in terms of you mentioned about the potential for reduction of silver usage in our production. So the Zero Busbar modules or cells, they use lower silver by as much as about 10% reduction in silver.
And we believe that in longer term, we've got lot of other initiatives, again as we discussed last time also, including a potentially a complete replacement of silver with copper-based or even aluminium-based. That I would say broadly is about 1.5 to 2 years away. But in the meanwhile, we are working on a comprehensive program including reducing the silver consumption, hedging and passing the cost to our consumers.
Prakhar Porwal:
Sure, that's very helpful. Second question is on the order book. If I look at the order book mix, 60% cells and 40% modules and very rough calculation maybe suggests around 4 gigawatt, 4.5
Page 11 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
gigawatt of module order book. So my question is, given we'll have 11 gigawatt odd of module capacity largely for the entire year.
So will that mean reduction in utilization levels and how to look at that? That is one. And second is, given it is a very big cell order book, so does this mean that we're selling to players who are more dominant in the retail category where we don't have that dominance right now? And so what are we doing exactly to increase our presence there? Those are the two questions.
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
So just to clarify on the cell order book, substantial portion of the order book also goes into FY28, so it's not in FY27 itself. These are contracts with module manufacturers whom we'll be supplying cells next year also. In terms of module utilization we are at almost about 11 gigawatt taking a 75% kind of a utilization, that's about a 7 gigawatt, 7.5 gigawatt. And then module orders we also see some potential possibilities of getting orders in every quarter. So these are orders which are in the order book which are long-term orders, whereas every quarter there is a order book which also comes up.
Vinay Rustagi:
So just to add to that I'll again point to if you look at the makeup of the market, almost half of the market is basically coming from the rooftop and the C&I segments. The rooftop segment never shows up in our order book because those are mainly cash and carry orders and they are booked on a daily, weekly, monthly basis.
And the C&I market, which is basically about estimated at about 15 gigawatt, the ALMM-2 has become -- is becoming applicable now. And with that, I think we are likely to see a surge in order placement by these customers. So in general, we are very, very optimistic that we will see the order pipeline is already very healthy and we will see a large surge in order booking by customers which will basically allow us to also fulfil or fill our production capacity.
Prakhar Porwal:
Understood. So just one clarification so the rooftop segment that you cater to, that is through the cash and carry distributor model?
Vinay Rustagi:
That's right, yes.
Prakhar Porwal:
Okay. Thank you so much and all the best for the coming quarters. Thank you.
Vinay Rustagi:
Thank you.
Moderator:
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Aditya Vikhram from DB Securities. Please go ahead.
Aditya Vikhram:
No, all my questions were answered. Thank you very much.
Moderator:
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Kunal Shah from DAM Capital. Please go ahead.
Kunal Shah:
Yeah, thanks for the follow-up. Sir, on the cell technology, now we've been much ahead of the industry, so we were amongst the first to introduce the G12R cells and now Zero Busbar as well. So what is the efficiency level in the Zero Busbar? How are like how is it getting received by
Page 12 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
the customers, like what feedback are you getting? And what would be the timelines for achieving the 25.8% that we sort of highlighted?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja: I'll let Sudhir answer this question.
Sudhir Reddy: I think on the efficiency front, it is going to be about 0.1% to 0.15% higher efficiency. This is basically due to higher exposure area in the Zero Busbar. But besides that, it has other advantages with respect to more robustness to shading and microcracks. That's the main advantage with respect to Zero Busbar.
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja: And your other question was on when do we reach 25.8% efficiency?
Sudhir Reddy: We are currently at an average efficiency in the TOPCon line at about 25.5%. Now that we are getting stabilized these lines with a 90% utilization, we expect to move forward gradually over the next few months, one step at a time. I would say at least it will take us couple of more quarters to get to that kind of efficiency levels.
Kunal Shah: Understood. This is helpful, sir. And sir, just a follow-up here. Now from here on like how do you see this efficiency curve panning out like what are the further tech upgradations or improvements that we are working upon which has already worked in China and if you could just provide some insights over there?
Sudhir Reddy: See, I think currently, if you see the efficiency trends in China, they are on a mass production, it's still hovering around 25.6 to 25.8 even for the A-grade ones. What you see these announcements around 26 and all are more for the champion cells and not the mass production cell efficiencies.
With the TOPCon technology, you hit a bar somewhere around 26% to 26.1%. Beyond that, efficiency improvement just at the TOPCon cell is not possible. It will need more innovations, more into tandem cell technology, back contact and all these kind of newer technologies which will take some more time to mature on a mass production scale. I think we are at least a couple of more years from 2 to 3 years at least from seeing mass-produced tandem modules.
Kunal Shah: Got it. This is very helpful, sir. Second, in terms of the backward integrations, you've talked about aluminium frames. So are there any other verticals also that we are looking or contemplating upon in terms of insourcing of raw materials or anything of that sort?
Vinay Rustagi: See Kunal, I think that remains a watching piece for us. We have to wait and see how the government policy evolves. We know that the government is quite keen to start getting all these components also made in India. But what is the exact policy and what are the timelines, we will have to kind of wait to see how that shapes up and accordingly we will decide what is best for the business.
Kunal Shah: Got it. And so lastly on Transcon, like it's a bit untouched now with respect to the upcoming 10 gigawatt hour capacity. Could you just give some like how do the milestones look like here in terms of getting the required certification and especially because it's an HV, EHV segment, how are we progressing on the talent acquisition as well, if you could just tell that? Thank you.
Page 13 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
Vinay Rustagi:
Yeah, sure. So Kunal, in terms of milestones, this plant is due for completion in July this year. And the good thing is that because of the strong management team in place and the fact that the company already has existing production facilities, they have already started producing some of the larger transformers and doing type testing and certification work which can take as long as 6 to 12 months.
So I think the company is making very steady progress on that. In terms of management team, there is already a strong management team as we have shown in our previous presentations which is ex-Toshiba and some of the other majors in the electrical goods industry. And we believe that the company has already secured amongst their first orders. So it will take about 2 years for the company to fully ramp up their operations, but they are well on track to beginning commercial production and achieving certification in this timeline.
Kunal Shah:
Understood. Just a clarification, from which like which client have we got the order from?
Vinay Rustagi:
See, unfortunately, I can't give you the client name, Kunal.
Kunal Shah:
Understood. This is very helpful, sir. Thank you so much.
Vinay Rustagi:
Sure. Thank you.
Moderator:
Thank you. The next question is from the line of Aritra Banerjee from Nomura. Please go ahead.
Aritra Banerjee:
Yeah. Hi. Thank you for taking my question and congratulations for a very good set of numbers. So sir, just wanted to ask one bookkeeping question. So on Slide number 22, the sales that you've mentioned is 21,751 million, whereas in the reported financials, the sales number is 22,303, the revenue from operations. So just wanted to understand why the difference?
Vinay Rustagi:
Yeah, sure. So what you see on this slide, Aritra, is only the cell and module sales because this order book is only for cells and modules. But in addition to this, we obviously have the projects and the EPC business. So the rest of the revenue is coming from that line, which is not showing here.
Aritra Banerjee:
Okay, sir. Understood. And another question I wanted to ask was sequentially the share of modules in the revenue has gone up, but still like the overall margins have remained stable. So I understand like the DCR share in the module revenue has also gone up. But typically, like cells have sharper margin profile than DCR module business as well.
So going forward, even like going forward, even if the cells' share in the revenue comes down, are the margins still expected to remain same or in other words, are like DCR module business revenue and cell business revenue margins the same? Could you please share some colour on that?
Vinay Rustagi:
So Aritra I think unfortunately we can't predict the future and we can't say how the margins are going to play out in future. But you can see what is the current shape of our order book. And we've said earlier that the order book pricing is consistent with what we have seen over the last 6 to 12 months.
Page 14 of 15
Premier Energies
Premier Energies Limited
May 15, 2026
So that gives us a good visibility in terms of the volumes as well as—as well as pricing and margins. But going forward, the mix is only going to become more favourable wherein the DCR share is going to grow at the cost of the non-DCR market, which is a much lower margin market. So overall, I think the margin outlook for the business is likely to be favourable going into the future.
Aritra Banerjee:
Understood, sir. And just one last question regarding the ALMM list 2 implementation. So hypothetically speaking, if it doesn't get implemented, let's say in June 2026 or it gets delayed by some months, so is there any risk of some of the orders in our current order book getting cancelled going forward or is that not a material risk?
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
No, it's not a material risk because none of the orders in our order book are from the C&I segments which are deliveries in the next 2 or 3 months. So if you look at what business is going to come up from 1st June, it is going to be the C&I business which will immediately move into the DCR mix.
And most of these C&I developers have finished or have completed their installations with the 1st June deadline. So the orders in our order book from that segment are post October-November. So even if the DCR or the implementation gets delayed by a quarter, it would not affect any of our orders and we don't see any material risk there.
Aritra Banerjee:
Understood, sir. Thanks for the answers and all the best for the upcoming quarters.
Chiranjeev Singh Saluja:
Thank you.
Moderator:
Thank you. As there are no further questions from participants, I now hand the conference over to management for closing comments.
Vinay Rustagi:
Yeah, thank you. So thank you everyone for your time. I appreciate it's a Friday evening. You know, just to conclude the call and how we see the business, see there is a lot of noise in the market in relation to demand slowdown, strong competition, cost and margin pressures, etcetera.
We believe that our performance over the last year has been a very strong validation of the company's overall business strategy, management competence and execution. In general, we are very, very positive on the growth outlook for the sector given all the initiatives by the government. And we are now, in fact, beginning to think beyond the current plans and looking to next stage of growth in terms of products, technologies and geographies. We are grateful for your support and look forward to working with you. Thank you very much.
Moderator:
Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of ICICI Securities Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us and you may now disconnect your lines. Thank you.
Page 15 of 15