GDL FY08 net profit down 5% to Rs 74 Crores

Gateway Distriparks Ltd (GDL) has reported good growth in volumes, revenues and operating profits in the quarter and year ended 31 March 2008. However, due to reduction in Investment Income & increase in depreciation, amortization and start-up costs in the Rail business, net profit declined by 5% (YoY).

The fully diluted earnings per share (EPS) in FY 08 was Rs 6.40.

Segment-wise performance (FY 08 vs FY 07) :

CFS Business : Throughput grew by 48 % to 330,834 TEUs, Revenue grew by 35 % to Rs 191 Crores and Profit after tax was up 7 % to Rs 80 Crores.

Rail Business : Throughput doubled to 36,666 TEUs, while Revenue quadrupled to Rs 51 Crores. However, due to depreciation, amortization and other start-up costs, there was a net loss of Rs 6 Crores.

Cold Chain Business : Total Income grew from Rs 9.50 Crores (Nov 06 to Mar 07) to Rs 29 Crores in FY 08, the first full year of operations after GDL became the majority shareholder. The company has made a cash profit of about Rs 94 Lakhs before taking into account an investment income of Rs 2.50 Crores. However, after providing Depreciation of Rs 2.96 Crores and taxes of Rs 54 Lakhs, the company made an overall loss of Rs 6 Lakhs.

"Our core CFS business has done well with all the CFSs (Navi Mumbai, Chennai & Vizag) posting significant growth in volumes, revenues & profits. We have also commenced CFS operations at Kochi towards the end FY 08" said Mr Gopinath Pillai, Chairman, GDL.

"Our new businesses, viz., Rail & Cold Chain Logistics are stabilizing and are showing encouraging signs of growth in both volumes and revenues.

"As regards Rail, we have acquired and deployed eight of our own container trains in various routes. Further four container trains are expected to be deployed shortly. We are confident that our investment and efforts to scale up the operations will start yielding results in the current financial year (FY 09)", Mr Pillai added.

About Gateway Distriparks Limited

GDL is a Container logistics company with Pan-India presence providing Container Freight Station (CFS) and Inland Container Depot (ICD) services. GDL operates two large CFSs at JNP, an ICD at Garhi Harsaru, near Gurgaon and CFSs at Chennai & Vizag. GDL has entered the cold chain logistics business through its subsidiary, Snowman Frozen Foods Limited, a JV with Mitsubishi Group and through another subsidiary, Gateway Rail Freight Limited (GRFL) has commenced operation of own container trains.