Agarwal excited about market momentum and customer wins in key markets
Pune-headquartered STL (NSE: STLTECH) said its fibre manufacturing facility in China and cable facility in the US have begun commercial operations and will help the company capture new demand, especially driven by 5G roll out.
The China unit was shut due to pandemic.
STL has invested Rs.200 crore in new facilities in the US and the UK to boost optical fibre cable capacity to 42 million fibre kilometres from 33 million fibre kilometres.
The company has signed a multi-million-dollar deal for optical interconnect, which comprises of plug and play FTTx accessories and connectorised solutions, with a leading European telecom service provider.
It has also secured orders worth ~Rs.500 crore in India on the back of 5G roll outs. It is working with Indian service providers for their pan-India fibre roll out.
With integrated value chain and capabilities on optical side, STL continued to win in its focus markets of US and Europe.
STL Managing Director Ankit Agarwal said, “As we look ahead, I see technology innovation and R&D playing a pivotal role in our journey to become one of the top optical players in the world.
“I am excited about the market momentum and the pace of customer wins in our key markets.”
Fibre dense networks have become absolutely critical for both digital inclusion and advanced use cases. Service providers across the globe want to take more fibre, faster to their customers. In India, the 5G rollout is in full steam and presents the need for rapid fiberisation, he said.
STL is constantly investing in fundamental capabilities and R&D to pack in more capacity and innovation into these optical network builds. The company is driving towards scalable growth in the Optical business and sustainable revenue streams in the Global Services business.
“Keeping a close eye on its ambition to become Net-zero by 2030, STL concerted its efforts on sustainable operations by reducing its carbon emissions by 6,400 tCO2e, and diverting 33,000+ MT of waste from landfills.
“It also continued to press forward on water stewardship initiatives by harvesting and recycling of more than 125,000 m3 of water,” he said.
Agarwal reported robust order book of Rs.12,054 crore. On the back of its capability to engineer unique solutions for service providers, the company signed multi-million, multi-year contracts with top-tier service providers.
Elaborated Agarwal, “Our performance this quarter has been strong. Sharp focus on cash and profitability, and calibrated exits from sub-scale businesses have poised us for long-term growth.
“Quarter four and beyond, we will continue to prioritise growth areas, optimise our capital structure, and execute with discipline.”
STL demonstrated sharp focus on growth areas, operational efficiencies and strategic capital allocation resulting in strong financial performance.
The nine-month revenue rose 28% on the year to Rs.5,050 crore and three-month revenue was up by 12%/y at Rs.1,882 crore at 31 Dec 2022.
EBITDA was up 17%/y at Rs.651 crore for nine months and up 8%/y at Rs.252 crore for three months.
STL is a leading global optical and digital solutions company providing advanced offerings to build 5G, Rural, FTTx, Enterprise and Data Centre networks. The company, driven by its purpose of ‘Transforming Billions of Lives by Connecting the World’, designs and manufactures in 4 continents with customers in more than 100 countries. fiinews.com
