ESSAR PORTS

Formerly known as Essar Shipping and Logistics the company did well in Q1FY14. On a 22% (YoY) rise in revenue at Rs.404 crore, the company posted a 48% rise in net profit at Rs.101 crore, up 10% sequentially. EBIDTA  was up 21% at Rs.328 crore, up 9% (QoQ). The good performance was on the back of higher cargo volume. The company handled 14.08 million tonnes of cargo, up 11%(YoY) but this is lower than 14.82 MMT in Q4FY13. The company has won the bid for the development of three iron ore berths at Visakhapatnam for 30 years. These three berths have a combined capacity of 23 MMTPA. Two berths are in operational condition and will contribute to its revenues. It handled 12 MMT of iron ore in FY13. Its third party terminals of Paradip (Port) and Vizag (Port) is also expected to bring in a good customer mix. Looking ahead, the company plans to change this portion of the revenue mix – third-party cargo contributes 5% to the revenue and the company wants to hike it to 25% over next 3 years.

Essar Ports is the second largest port companies of India, with a current capacity of 104MMTPA. The capacity is to be expanded to 158MMTPA over the next few years. It has three operational terminals at Hazira, Vadinar and Paradip. The Hazira port is an all-weather, deep-draft port with 30MMTPA of dry bulk and break bulk cargo handling capacity. Vadinar is also an all-weather, deep-draft port with 58MMTPA of liquid cargo handling capacity. Paradip dry bulk terminal was commissioned in December 2012 and is an all-weather, deep-draft port with 16MMTPA of dry bulk cargo handling capacity. The company is currently developing one terminal at Paradip, which will be a coal berth of 14MMTPA. The company is also setting up a dry bulk terminal at Salaya with a capacity of 20MMTPA. Additionally, the company plans to expand its Hazira Port capacity by 20MMTPA, taking its capacity to 50MMTPA.