IGL to foray into EV space; to begin battery swapping by this year-end

Indraprastha Gas Ltd (IGL) reported its earnings for the June-ended quarter. The key positive is that gross margin has recovered this quarter. AK Jana, MD of IGL, discussed the earnings fineprint.

“We will be entering into the electric vehicles (EVs) also and we have signed the MoU with Kinetic Green for 50 stations. We are going to do the battery swapping by the end of this year,” he said.

“The concern of government and producer is that the increase should be there and how much is a question. Even they are going for $1-$2, we are calculating that. Normally the pricing formula what we are following is that we should do the business on volume since we are retail sector rather than being on margin.”

“And the formula says that the gas cost plus the supply and delivery cost and the operating cost plus taxes imposed by the various rates and then margin. So, these all put together is my pricing. So, gas cost normally whatever it is increased we are making pass-through or decrease also in other cases we will be doing so,” he said.

“Today I am selling at a price of Rs 43 even if I add Rs 47-48 there, it is less than Rs 50. At this price, we used to sell in FY20 also – that is number one. Number two - none of the city gas distribution (CGD) entities are selling less than Rs 55 at anywhere in India. So I have a margin, I have a cushion, so there should not be any problem,” he added.