Balmer Lawrie keen on pharma and engg goods

Kolkata: The pandemic-driven degrowth in most of its business verticals notwithstanding, the logistics services business of the State-run Balmer Lawrie & Co Ltd recorded top line and bottom line growth of nearly 40 per cent and 38 per cent respectively in the FY21 as compared to the previous year. The growth in this business was driven by incremental business in nearly all activities of freight forwarding, especially in ocean freight and air export activities, said Adika Ratna Sekhar, C&MD (Additional Charge) and Director (HR & CA), Balmer Lawrie & Co Ltd.

The growth has prompted the company to focus on the private sector especially in export and also eye the business of handling project cargo of private customers. With increased focus on healthcare and government reforms to boost the infrastructure and manufacturing units, the SBU aims at pharma and engineering goods EXIM market in the coming years, said Sekhar, while addressing the 104th annual general meeting of the company.

The Miniratna under the ministry of petroleum and natural gas and is present in eight businesses - travel and vacations, industrial packaging, greases and lubricants, leather chemicals, logistics, logistics infrastructure, logistics services, and refinery and oil field services

The other business which has been showing consistent growth in volume, turnover, profitability and profits is industrial packaging. And FY21 was no exception. Although, Covid-19 led to overall compressed demand across industry segments with sales volumes under pressure and despite the adverse market situation, the SBU was able to close the FY21 with healthy profits. The SBU improved its overall efficiency through continuous operational excellence across various manufacturing units. The SBU now expects to experience significant growth in the years to come, with the biggest drivers being the chemicals, transformer oils and lubes segments. The SBU has plans to aggressively expand in the exports segment.

Meanwhile, Balmer Lawrie's net turnover dropped marginally 1.2 per cent from Rs 1612 crore in FY20 to Rs 1593 crore in FY21. The company recorded a profit before tax (PBT) of Rs 157 crore in 2020-21 as against Rs 232 crore in 2019-20.

Travel and Vacations business of the company has been most severely impacted amongst all businesses due to the Covid-19 crisis. Interestingly however, despite the difficult times, travel has strengthened its operation, sales and software capabilities, increased its clientele, bringing more clients on SSBT/SBT by offering holistic cost-effective customised services to corporate clients. In order to reduce operation cost, the business has also tried to venture in the private sector by delivering superior service to its customers, he said.