Alkyl Amines Chemicals Limited (ALKYLAMINE) Q4 2026 Earnings Call Transcript

Ladies and gentlemen, good day and welcome to Q4NF26 earning conference call of Alkyl Amines Chemicals Limited, hosted by Ambit Capital Private Limited. This conference call may contain forward-looking statements about the company which are based on the beliefs, opinion, and expectation of the company as on date of this call. These statements are not the guarantee of future performance and involve risk and uncertainties that are difficult to predict. As a reminder, all participant line 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 touch-tone phone. Please note that this conference is being recorded. I now hand the conference over to Mr. Kumar Soumya from Ambit Capital. Thank you, and over to you, sir.

Thanks, Danish. Good afternoon, everyone. Welcome to 4Q and F126 post-result conference call of Alkyl Amines Chemicals Limited. From the management, we have with us today Mr. Kirat Patel, Executive Director, Mr. Chintamaneet Bhate, General Manager Legal, and Company Secretary. This is Kanchan Shinde, Chief Financial Officer. I will now request Kirat sir for an opening remark, post which we will open the floor for Q&A. Over to you, sir.

Thank you, Kumar, and welcome everybody to the annual investor call. Thank you for the interest you've shown in the company. I shall just give a few opening remarks and then we will open the line for questions. The year has been a little challenging. We did begin the year with a little bit of optimism, thinking that there will be some growth. However, as you can see from the results, Both the top line and the bottom line had more or less remained flat, plus minus 1% of what it was last year. Within that, the concern has been that the markets have not grown as fast as we would have liked. However, the good part is we have managed to retain and perhaps even slightly increase our market share in various markets that we operate in. Of course, the year could be split up into 11 months and another one month in March after the war has begun. And as you would be aware, we had informed the stock exchange both about the issues we had had with sourcing ammonia in March And subsequently... How we have been able to manage to keep the plans running. So we have had a few challenges in March in operations, but we have by and large overcome it. But of course, the future remains a little uncertain as long as the war continues, which we hope will get resolved soon. With these opening remarks, I will open the floor for questions on specific issues or specific questions you may have about our products, markets, investments, on the numbers which have been released yesterday. And please, Kumar, you can start the questions going. Thank you.

Thank you so much, sir. Ladies and gentlemen, 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 two. Participants are request to use handsets while asking a question. Ladies and gentlemen, we will wait for a moment while the question queue assembles. A first question comes from the line of Rohit Nagraj from 361 Capital. Please go ahead.

Thanks for the opportunity. Also, just one question in terms of the demand dynamics that we have seen over the last couple of months, given that the raw material prices have increased and that must have been partially at least reflected in the higher product prices. So, how has been the user demand given the current context and what do we expect in the near future? Will it have any kind of demand challenges which will emanate because if the higher pricing continues to stay for some time? Thank you.

Okay, yes, you are right that the immediate impact of the war has been that the prices have risen. Both of our raw materials and subsequently we have raised our finished good prices to protect our margins. It is a bit difficult to predict whether this will have an impact on the demand. At the moment, of course, we haven't seen it because it's too early. But we have one thought process that in most of our customers' products, we are actually a very minor cost in their cost of material. It's what you might call a C item. So they have bigger problems to worry about in their major items. So, the pressure on pricing may not be from the customers as much as from competition, and competition is already facing the same. I suspect though the prices have risen, they will not go back to the pre-February prices very soon. It will take some time for them to readjust. We think that it will continue for a little longer, this price hike, until the supply chain sorts itself out.

Thank you so much, and all the very best.

Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, anyone who wishes to ask a question, may press star and one. Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Dhruv Murchal from HDFC AMC. Please go ahead.

Yes, sir. Thank you so much. Sir, if you can help us, what would be a volume growth for FY26B?

It's been basically flat, volume and value, one plus minus one percent. Either way, prices have dropped 1% and volume has probably dropped 1%. Got it. So the combination is about 2% drop.

Got it.

But within that, of course, between products, there has been a lot of change, yeah.

Sir, on the RMFDT, now ammonia is a key element for you. Yes. I'm trying to understand the disruption that we see and Middle East being a large producer. So, curious to understand, I understand the prices are increased, and at price, probably some material is available. But at a broader industry level, is ammonia easily available? And, I mean, if the hypothesis is if it is available across the board, for across the players, although at a higher price, the oversupply concern that to some degree, which was there in the industry, would remain, and how do these spreads improve then? So I'm just trying to look on the price I've improved. Do the improvement in spreads happen? Because if it's, the point is, if it's available only to you, or probably a few players like you, then I can understand the spread improvement. But if it is available across, how does the spread improvement happen?

Okay, so one is about the availability of ammonia. Yes, there was in March, a week or two, when we had grave concerns about availability. But the sourcing improved. Most of our suppliers managed to source the ammonia for us. And the disruption was very short, and our inventors took care of the gap, you know. Going forward, yes, like Ammonia, as you said, we were in the region of about 50 rupees a kg, and now we are over 100 rupees a kg. So, obviously, the cost of production has risen, and we have had to pass it on to customers. As I said earlier, the customers have Being able to absorb the cost at the moment, whether this will lead to some demand destruction is a question for the future. But currently, yes, we have been able to source it, and I suspect that most of our competitors have also been able to find their sources of ammonia. So the marketplace has remained balanced. So, rise in margins may be just purely inventories. You know, if you had inventories of the cheaper ammonia or the cheaper raw material and you produced it for a month or two, you will get an advantage. But after that, it will settle down to the regular comparative margins.

And when you say the availability is reasonable, does it mean you are able to operate the plant at the level you desire, or, I mean, it is at a lower level, although sufficient enough? I'm just trying to understand the degree of availability.

Yeah, so, our plants are running, we have a little bit of headrooms, on an average we must be having. Between 60% and 85% capacity utilization. And that we continue to get enough raw material to keep there. Yes, if the market grows suddenly to more, we'll have to source more ammonia. But, you know, the amount of ammonia the aliphatic industry requires is between 10 to 15,000 tons a year, I mean, per month. So, it's a fraction of what the country needs. For the government to allocate 0.05 percent, which is a critical raw material going into agricultural inputs to drugs. Thank you. It will take some time for the industry to sort the supply chain out. Maybe another three months, maybe six months for it to stabilize. Hopefully, by that time, all this hormones trade will be opened out and we will be able to manage a reasonable amount.

Sure, sir. Perfect. Sir, one other question was, if any update on the project that you were implementing in, I think, Curcum? Yes.

So, that project was to be commissioned in this quarter, April to June. We are slightly delayed. It will probably be the first beginning of the next quarter that the project will get commissioned. Mechanical completion is going on. Mechanical completion is going to be completed somewhere at the end of June.

And the economics remains broadly the same.

Yes, the economics of the project have not been affected, even though there has been a slight delay. The economics of the project has not been affected. Even though, even both in that case also, the raw materials and the finished goods both rises in line with everything else, you know.

Sure. Perfectly agreed. Thank you so much. I'll join the queue. Thank you. Thank you.

Our next question comes from the line of Pankaj Tibrewal from Ikegai Asset. Please go ahead. Good afternoon, sir.

Good afternoon. So, two questions. One, you know, last three years when I look at our performance, obviously, we were impacted by the product pricing correcting significantly led by Chinese import. And Chinese were selling at a price which was at times below the cost of production, especially in aceto and ethylamines and methyl chain. How is the situation now? Can you give us the colors and the way we saw in the last three years? Do you think that finally, even if the price is revert, will it settle much above, and can the company now start to deliver double-digit kind of a growth, which will be a combination of volume plus pricing? So just a color on across the chain and the import side will be quite helpful.

Okay, the first thing is the Chinese were not in the methyl amines field, where the competition was largely domestic.

Yeah, yeah.

While acetone nitrile, where we got the, in July, where we got the anti-dumping duty, it took a little time for it to materialize and we only got the benefit of the anti-dumping duty towards the end of the year. Initially, there was a lot of inventory in the pipeline. So, in anticipation of the anti-dumping duty, people had imported more. And after that, the Chinese themselves cut prices, which they finally, I think, reverted back to their... So towards the end of the year, we did see some improvement in our pricing in acetonitrile, and therefore volumes started tripping up and our market share started moving a little better. Going forward, whether at these elevated prices... Whether we will be able to deliver growth on volume and obviously in terms of value it will grow because the prices have got elevated. But in terms of volume, one is not sure. We expect that the next year will be like a normal year which is about 5-10% growth rate. But there is too much uncertainty in the future.

On the aceto side, what will be the pricing now?

Today, I think we are at about... It's over 200 now, rupees per kg, but then acidic acid has also risen considerably, you know.

And last year's average is what? 200 rupees per kg, 200 and odd rupees per kg, I think. No, last year's average for us? Last year's average was, it came down to something like 140, 150. So, it's gone up by almost 30-40% from there. Yeah, but so has the raw materials, you know. Yeah, yeah, sure, sure, sure. And on the ethyl and methyl chain also, the margins had come down to two-decadal low. How is this naive from a spread perspective? Are you seeing improvement and plus the volume of tech because we have a lot of capacity also. So, can you give us some color on that side of the business, please?

So, in ethyl, the market has adjusted and the margins have improved. But in methalis, we find still that geotemporarily there will be some disruption because of ammonia. But now that we have four players in methalamine in the country, we expect there will be competition in methalis. Because now Aarti has also commissioned their plant, and therefore they expect to be.

And ethyl, can you give us some color on the spread and how is it behaving now?

Ethyl has been only two of us, Balaji and us, in the market. And there has been a somewhat stable market share kind of rationing or whatever. And prices have stabilized. In fact, they have also increased because alcohol has increased. And margins have been protected.

Last question on Aceto. Can you give us a color on the imports by Chinese? How is it behaving now?

In the last quarter, I think there has been some improvement from us. I mean, in the sense that they have reduced their imports because they have raised their prices. So more and more, our market share has been increasing. But that's only the last quarter. It took almost six months from July all the way to... January, December, January, for the pipeline and the aggressive behavior of the Chinese to change.

And from a demand perspective, last con-call you all mentioned because of the tariff issues, a few of your clients had suffered, and that's why the volume had become a little lower. How is it the feedback from the clients right now because the tariff issue is now behind? So what are the pharma guys, the API and the peptide guys are saying how should we look at the pharma demand perspective?

I think the pharma has always been a little optimistic. They were exempt from most of these tariffs, you know. There was a danger in the oil and gas field where we were supplying, which had an impact. That was on one of the products which we used to sell. But I think, and where the peptides is concerned, there is still a lot of optimism, I would say, a lot of talk about growth. But most of it has to still materialize, you know. It's still early days. Just March they got their, I think, waiver of these things. So they've all launched somewhere in the last month only. And yes, we have supplied materials to all the players, but we are waiting to see how that growth takes place. We are optimistic that in acetonitrile to peptides there will be some volume growth.

But have you been able to now assess the market for us for peptides on aceto?

Difficult, because everybody is giving different optimistic figures, but I don't think that will all hold, you know. They are all very gung-ho about it, but it's not going to be that. But, you know, the acetonitrile market is about... 30,000 tons or so, and this will be maybe 10% of the hold, you know. So something will go up, something will go down. So the total market is not disrupted by it, you know. It's not a disruption, but it's a great addition, you know.

I know the company is quite conservative in overall, you know, outlook always. But when I look at the last three years, it's not been a very inspiring time for the company because of various reasons from an outside perspective. The way we are standing now, and obviously things will change because it's an uncertain world, you think that now probably we are on a growth path back again, and things should be materially better than what it has been in the last three years, where we suffered from all the fronts.

Short answer, yes. I think we look forward to our, what I would say, cautious optimism. I think we will do better than what we have over the years. We have seen the worst of times, I think. Of course, in life you never say that because something always comes around. Yes, I am optimistic that we are likely to see better times in the future.

Thank you and wish you all the best and the team also. Thank you. Thank you, Pankaj.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Harishiv Gujarati from Niveshay. Please go ahead.

First of all, I would like to ask a similar question. So, all these China anti-involution policy, how big is the catalyst for us? So, they are cutting from the catastrophes on the chemical and sector overall. So, how big is the benefit for us? I wanted to ask that.

Sorry, can you just repeat the question? What is the...

Parishit, I'm sorry to interrupt you, but your voice is breaking. Make sure that you have a stable network. Thank you.

Hello, hello. Am I audible now?

Yes, you are audible.

Yes, so what happened from the past, people heard that Chinese were dumping. And now, in the anti-involution policy, we are trying to cut the capacities in their country. So, how do you benefit from this?

Yes, so, we have seen over the last quarter, a reduction in the aggressiveness of the Chinese. And we hope it will continue. So if that happens, then of course, not just us, all the Indian manufacturers will benefit in terms of reduced competition from the Chinese, some of it which was quite unfair, you know. And we hope that will help us restore our margins to the levels which we were hoping, you know. Of course, this path that they have taken should be consistent, you know. It's not necessary that they are going to continue to cut capacities as they have promised, and in all sectors.

So, sir, on the margins side, what margins can we expect from now? Can we take that deal to the bottom of margins? And from now, here on, what improvement can we expect?

So, as I said earlier, that yes, we are optimistic that we have seen probably the worst and we hope to see better times in the future. With the proviso that there is always something which can happen, you know, nobody predicted the war and what can happen. At the moment, of course, the benefit of lower raw material and higher finished goods prices. I don't think we'll see very quickly because this is going to take some time for these prices to come down.

Okay, and in the volume terms, you are guiding 5-10% volume growth.

That is what we expect, that the country will be growing anyway at 5-7% and we grow along with it, you know.

Okay, so what I wanted to understand that, is this a very big catalyst or a medium-term, short-term catalyst? Thank you. So, is this a very big catalyst for us or not?

A very big...

Catalyst.

Catalyst for...

This is China's policy?

No, no, no. It's not that significant. Yes, it does help because you can get maybe 5% more selling price if the Chinese become less aggressive. But they are still present, you know, it's not as if they have completely gone out of the market. So, there will be some advantage if they will stop acting so aggressively, because they themselves have to meet their own return on investments and all that, you know. But it will be... Not dramatic benefit, but some benefit, you know.

Okay. Got it.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Gagan Dixit from Ilara Securities. Please go ahead.

Gagan Rikshit has left the queue.

We'll move forward to the next participant. Our next question comes from the line of Rajiv Rupani, an individual investor. Please go ahead.

Yes, sir. Thank you for the opportunity. Sir, in last con call, you had talked about there are some products in the R&D pipeline, which you may think about in the next by Feb, March. So, could you please update us? When do you plan to launch?

So, there are two things. One is, of course, the product which we are already launching, which will, as I said earlier, will probably come into the market in July, which is also from our R&D pipeline. There were a few other products which we are looking at. But we have got them on to engineering stage, but we will take a final decision on whether to invest or not into this, after this, you know, volatility in the market settles, because some of them, the profitability, we need to have a slightly longer term vision on these products. When the, you know, we start. Almost four to five years from conceptualization to come to the bench trail to engineering, and in that time, a lot of commercials change. So, depending on how it goes, we have to take a slightly longer-term view, and given the volatility just now, we are being a little cautious before going forward with anything major, whether it is 20 crores or 50 crore investment, or even 200 crore investment. We are being a little careful.

So, by next call, we will have a better view?

I'm not sure. I hope so, because this volatility, I think this war will end. So, I'm sure we will be able to be a little more optimistic about the future, and be a little more understanding of where the prices are settling, you know, and who's still left standing.

Okay. And my next question was on ACN. So, what do you think will be the capacity utilization in the coming year? And what was this last year?

So, we've, you know, as you know, we have about 30,000 ton capacity between two plants. And we have enough capacity to last us for a couple of years. So, we don't seem, we are not worried too much about the capacity utilization at the moment.

Okay, and going forward, the capacity utilization of methyl amines and ethyl amines, could you guide us?

So, methyl could be invested, I think, about three, four years ago in a very large plant, which could last us for maybe five or ten years at that time. So, there is no question of ethyl amines. We have enough capacity for the next four to five years. The growth is natural in this 5 and 10% which we see. Though last year it was a little dull for growth, but we think that we have enough ethylamines capacity and between us and Balaji, the country has enough capacity for ethylamines. Methylamines, there is an overhang of capacity because a new player has come in. So there is RCA, Balaji, Aarti and Azna. So there is a bit of over capacity of methylamines. And that will take some time to fill out. I'm feeling the heart.

And my last question was on the raw material side. So, if there is an improvement in the availability of raw materials, do you think, and the prices go down, the finished, our finished product prices also go down by that percentage or we can maintain the prices, current prices?

Yeah, what happens normally is that the prices come down. There is a phase lag, of course. When supply improves and prices come down, finished good prices come down with a lag, because that comes with competition. So there is a portion of time where your margins improve, but that is only temporary. But my view is that I don't think the prices will come down to the old levels very soon because the damage that has been done to the petrochemical industry is going to be difficult to repair in the short term. It is going to be repaired, of course, but it will take a little time for it to come back.

Thank you.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Abhinav Mandora from Equitas Investments. Please go ahead.

Thank you so much for giving the opportunity. The first question is with the incremental ammonia price, I understand that in the March month, we could get the availability of the ammonia, but going forward with higher prices of ammonia, do we pass on the entire incremental price, A, and B, how are our contracts placed, like is it long term, short term, how, what is the month, and what is the quarter?

Well, at the moment, if you look at the, we have been able to get ammonia even beyond March. The prices have not dropped. We have been able to pass on the increase. I mean, our customers are understanding, very understanding about the fact that, you know, with ammonia doubling, we are not able to supply them the material at the old prices. But they have absorbed it. As I said, because a lot of our chemicals are a C item in the whole. Going forward, I think, yes, if the prices come, supply improves and prices come down, the finished group prices will also adjust, maybe with a phase lag, because ultimately it's the competition, you know, and we have any of our products, most of our products have either the Chinese or internal competition, which ultimately grabs, tries to grab market share. So, competition finally sets the price. So, you don't probably enjoy a temporary margin widening, but it's only temporary.

Got it. And secondly, in order to understand the nature of our contracts.

Yes. At the moment, the ammonia contracts are on short term, because prices are high and nobody is willing to commit, you know. So they're all, all contracts are shown, it's almost, well, it's not day-to-day, but it's fairly short compared to what we used to do earlier, because nobody is willing to commit longer term.

Got it. Also, I just wanted to broad view on how are you seeing the user industry sectoral trend? Are you seeing a demand flow-down, particularly in agro, pharma? I think these two are your biggest stakes.

Well... At the moment, we haven't seen anything, but there is a little bit of concern that they could be affected, not pharma as much as... With monsoon, also with the El Nino and all, there is some concern. But I don't see the pharma industry being affected by that.

How much for us pharma would be as a user industry, around 50%?

Maybe between 50 and 60% of our sales are to pharma, and another maybe 15%, 10-20% to Agro.

While you say that Mitha and Lamine have competition, etc., etc., when do you see the entire absorption of this incremental capacity which RT is also getting, and how do you see this panning out? Like, how has the cycle been earlier when a new competitor has arrived and the supply has increased? Like, in this scenario, how difficult it would be to pass on the raw materials, right?

So, this new competitor in methyl amines has not happened for 30 years. 35 years, if I am not right. So, there is no comparative kind of scenario, and this is the first time we are seeing such a thing. Yes, earlier the three of us, Balaji, RCF, and us, have had capacity expansions regularly every few years, and All of us have spare capacity now. For all of it to be absorbed, it will take a lot of time. Because it's a bit of a mystery why Aarti went into this industry when there was already there was over capacity. There was enough capacity and then they put another new plant so we had even more over capacity. I think there is no issue, it will continue to grow and it will take another, for us to, we have actually a plant which is fairly large size and we can even be bottlenecked. So we don't see any problem in capacity for ethylamines. We are probably either the largest or the second largest producer of ethylamines in the world already.

And what will be the capacity utilization for both the products and what other products?

Well, we don't talk about individual products, but as I said earlier that most of our plants are between 60 to 85 percent capacity utilization. In the existing product capacity.

Our next question comes from the line of Gagan Dilshit from Ilara Security. Please go ahead.

Yeah, thanks for taking my question, sir. Sir, what is the plan, Capex, for FY27 and FY28, sir? Plan, sorry, what? Capex? Yeah, what is the Capex plan? Yeah.

So, there is no major business project. The current new product plant, which is going at Dahesh, is so bit of what is left over that we will incur in next year, and then few of the engineering projects. So, around it will be around 80 to 90 crores.

Okay, so there are no any new product, it's just the existing...

Right now, no. It can come up in between. Right now, nothing.

Okay. And about the raw material sites, given this situation of the raw material availability, so are you evaluating any alternate ammonia or methanol sourcing or any long-term contract for alternate routes just for the long-term purpose to avoid the similar shutdown risk in future sites?

Yeah, interesting question. You know, there's a lot of talk about green ammonia going around. And we are waiting to see if the prices of green ammonia offered can even come close to what the petrochem ammonia is. If that happens, that's a great thing for not just the country, for the world, because that would make a big difference. I think it will happen. It will take a little time. It will be three to five years before anything breakthroughs happen. Anyway, I think that's an alternative which will come up in the future.

Yeah, I think the whole gasification also government is focusing where methanol is the, I think, by-product for it.

Yeah, methanol is a by-product in coal gasification. So they are pushing, they should have. In fact, China did it 15 years ago. We should have also stepped in. We ignored it. We have only, I think, two or three coal gasification plants, and both of them, I think, in the steel industry.

Yeah, yeah. Yeah, that's on my side, sir. Thanks. Thanks. Thank you.

Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Mithil Mehta from Lucky Investment. Please go ahead.

Yeah, hi, sir. Good evening to the entirety. Sir, I just wanted to understand your current spreads, you know, with raw material prices going up, going down. How are the current spreads behaving for each of your products? I mean, you know, you could just... Tell me about methyl, ethyl, ethyl, ethyl, ethyl, ethyl, ethyl, ethyl. You are the larger ones.

Yeah, so, you know, in March, as I had mentioned earlier, we did get a little advantage because we had raw material stocks, which were of the old prices, while the finished good prices moved up. This kind of thing, we will not be able to sustain. But yes, the margins initially improve, and then they settle down because of competition. Whether they will settle down to the old pre-February or a little higher, we'll have to see. But we are optimistic that I think we have seen the bottom, so probably the margins going forward will be a little better than what we have experienced in the first 11 months of this year, of last year, sorry.

Thank you. Some margin increase from now on, in terms of EBITDA margin, about 100 to 150.

Every year it's difficult to say, but definitely I think we do foresee some improvement in our margins in the next year. But will it continue growing? That's just...

From this point of view, is it also fair to assume that our growth will be between

Well, between 5 and 10% volume growth. Higher than what they were. Obviously, there will be a lot of increase, but when volume grows, it will be between 5% and 10%.

So typically, you know, the higher inflationary sort of selling. We also sort of move up in a similar fashion, but, and our...

So, you are right, at the beginning, at every cycle, we gain, because there is always that We can change our finished food prices, while we do have contracts of the old or inventory of raw material with us. So there is a widening of margins in the initial stage. Then it settles down. Hopefully it will settle down to a better level than what it was before February. And And then if the prices start going down again, which may happen after... One year, whatever, you know, the time it takes for the supply chain to sort itself out, then we do have some view that raw materials come down faster than our finished goods. So again, we do get a little benefit sometimes. Flattening up. Given that there has been a boost in the prices, I do not think the prices will come down dramatically back to the February levels very soon. They are very, very different because in each of these, ethyl has three products, methyl has three products, some are long, some are short, and acetonitrile itself is having volatility, and they are very different trends, you know. Methyl is almost half the price of ethylamines, you know. So, they do go from... Methyl would be, say, 100, 110 rupees, and ethyl would be 200 rupees, you know, plus. Acetrotronidyl would be 200 rupees plus.

How much we produced this year? Is it E?

Yeah, I think we have produced overall, I think about 2% more, 1%? 1% more than last year. Thank you very much. We don't see it for the existing products, but as well. In case some of these R&D products work out, then we may suddenly come up with a requirement for CAPEX. This is just completing this project and maintenance capex. There's always some maintenance capex, you know, 20 crores, 30 crores, something like that.

You know, get some more understanding about these new products. So, which are these products actually? Are they, is there a completely new set of products and catering to new industries or?

Look, I think we have a policy and which we have mentioned earlier that we do not talk about our R&D products till the product is in the market. That means after the plant is commissioned and the product has come into the, then we announce it to the market. So, I don't want to discuss any R&D project, but globally, yes, we are in the specialty chemical market. By and large, we look at products which have at least two customers for the product, and in the areas which we know, you know, the life sciences. We have a wide range of customers, from rubber chemicals to water treatment to electronic chemicals.

My question to you was that how many projects would you be working at this time in your R&D?

Oh, at any point in time we have probably over a dozen projects working on it. Probably more. But at various stages, you know, some are right at the preliminary research stage, I mean, desk research, some are at... You know, final, what we call R&D Bible, meaning they're just finishing off all the data which the engineering requires. And there are some in the engineering stage, which is not R&D, but the project people, you know, technology transfer people. So, maybe a dozen products we'll be looking at at any point in time, you know. But as you said, you know, the... Out of which, actual, when they come to a stage where financial decision has to be made, can you just repeat the question you were asking? Sorry.

Actually, discussing about the new product, the new product.

Yeah, so as I was saying, that they have about a dozen products at any point in time, at various stages of development, from depth research all the way to engineering, you know. And most of the time, I mean, we have a policy that we will not talk about our products. Of course, our end customers probably know it earlier than anybody else because we do send them samples and discuss with them what they want because specifications and stuff like that. And a lot of these products come from them, you know, because they need them. So their approach is saying that, can you make this? And we need it in year two or three or whatever, you know. And we need so much quantity at approximately this price. So a lot of this, the customers are the first people, of course, to know about the products. And we, to the investors, we announce it when we actually have the product in the market. And out of these dozen, maybe one or two may survive, you know, to commercialization.

Okay, great, sir. Thank you very much for answering all the questions. Thank you. Sorry.

Sure, sir. Thank you. Our next question comes from the line of Nihar Modi from Millennium Money Finance. Please go ahead.

Hello. Thank you for the opportunity, sir. So, sir, I wanted to ask that you mentioned about green ammonia, but, sir, that is a different future perspective that can be planned on. So, sir, but is the company under any talks as of now to diversify its ammonia suppliers or, you know, maybe build a more aggressive inventory? So, something like this situation does not occur again?

Two questions, whether we can diversify our sources of ammonia. We are already dealing, you see, ammonia is... A very large commodity and we are only a very minor user of the total quantity. So we depend on distributors and suppliers of this who are mainly connected to the fertilizer plants and import this thing, importers. So we don't have a direct connection with say the manufacturer except for in one or two cases. But we have a diverse fight because there are so many fertilizer plants in this country, you know, most of them in the western region. So that is well supplied. This shortage of gas is something which is unique, never happened before. So that kind of situation can happen. As far as the green ammonia is concerned, we have been watching the development. Nobody is yet offering the ammonia in future. Yet. But I suspect that they will come to a stage very soon where they will be able to offer this material to us. Of course, we are not the major users. They are probably planning to offer it to other end users.

Okay, Debra. Thank you very much.

One more question.

Sure. Give me one minute to check, sir. Thank you.

Is there anybody else? Sure.

Sure. We'll take Rajiv as the last question. The next question from Rajiv Rupani, an individual investor. Please go ahead.

Yes, sir. Thank you for the opportunity once again. My question is, sir, our competitor Balaji is executing a large plant for ACN, which is coming up in the current year. So, 18,000 tons. So, what do you think will be impact on the prices and our capacity utilization? And my next question is the methyl amine. So, we are facing a lot of competition. Any new derivative products planned for methyl amines so that our margins increase? Thank you.

Two questions. One is Balaji putting up a new acetonitrile plant. Yes, of course, it can happen and he will ultimately make the competitive material. But that's in the future. And when it happens, we will see. Because there is already two or three other people who are making acetonitrile. But we seem to have an edge on the costing and the efficiencies. So that's where the catch comes. You have to have. The ability to manufacturing at a low cost, and we suspect that we will be the lowest cost manufacturer in this product for some time to come. Of course, it will have an impact on the market. It's not just Balaji, it's the Chinese also, you know. As far as the methylamine derivatives are concerned, we are always looking out for new products, and I said we will not talk about our new products. Which we make. Some of these new products are derivatives of RMEs. So, some methylamine derivatives will be in the R&D pipeline, which we are always looking at. But nothing we can announce just now. Okay.

Thank you very much.

Thank you for coming on to this annual call for investors, and I wish you all the best for the next year. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you so much. Ladies and gentlemen, on behalf of Alkyl Amines Chemical Limited, that concludes this conference. Thank you for joining us, and you may now disconnect your lines.

Thank you.