Dear Analyst, 

It is my pleasure to highlight the business performance of the Sasken Group for the first quarter of FY 2017 - 18, ending 30th June 2017. 

We must point out that certain statements made here or those we make subsequently in response to your queries concerning our future growth prospects are forward-looking statements. Please read the Safe Harbor clause in the second slide of our presentation for full details.

Let me begin by walking you through our financials for Q1 Fiscal 2018. In Q1 FY 2017-18, the consolidated revenues for the Sasken Group remained flat over the previous quarter to Rs. 117.58 crores. Consolidated Earnings before Interest, Depreciation, Taxes and Amortization cost for Q1 fiscal ‘18 were Rs. 12.82 crores, a decline of 14.9% sequential. Consolidated PAT for Q1 fiscal ‘18 was at Rs. 17.30 crores, down by 60.10% over the previous quarter. PAT margins for Q1 fiscal ’18 were 14.80%. Consolidated earnings per share, including exceptional item, was   Rs. 10.11 for the quarter. Cash and cash equivalents were approximately Rs.417.30 crores as of June 30th, 2017. 

People 

On the people front, the headcount for the Sasken Group stood at 1,959 as of June 30, 2017. The ability to attract and retain talent continues to be of primal importance to us. We are making concerted efforts to engage and retain our talent to contain attrition, which currently stands at 22.85 % for trailing twelve months. We stand committed to ensuring that our talent pool is best equipped with knowledge of standards, technologies & platforms and is the best in class. 

Utilization for the quarter averaged 79.60% and is expected to marginally improve in the coming quarters/ remain similar. 

Customers 

We have successfully added 6 new customers during the quarter taking the total number of active customers to 129.  
  
I will provide key highlights of our Business spanning both Product Engineering and Digital Transformation with commentary on the segments we serve therein.

Product Engineering Services

Our deep commitment to the Product Engineering Services space continues with a significant focus on the Semiconductors, Automotive Electronics, Communication, and Industrial area. In the semiconductor segment, we have nurtured deep relationships with companies which will enable us to be engaged early in the Product Development Lifecycle. We have strengthened relationships with a large semiconductor vendor and are working on their chipsets and platforms which are targeting the Automotive Electronics space.  Our existing offerings, in particular for modems in both Android and Linux platforms, continue to evolve to address the needs of customers. More specifically, we continue to see traction and serve needs arising from 4G variants for the IoT world and for V2X in the Auto world which are areas of investment in the modem space. 

In the automotive electronics segment, our repertoire of solutions includes validation of ADAS technologies and those that will help our customer build the car cockpit of the future. We believe our relationships with semiconductor companies and offering portfolio put us in a good position for garnering new wins in the automotive segment going forward. Our ongoing customer engagements with both Auto OEMs and Tier 1 companies continue to make steady progress. In the communication space, we have a proven track record of being a leader especially in providing services for smart and rugged device manufactures building products based on the Android platform. In smart devices, we continue with broad ranging engagements on the anticipated new release of Android, currently labeled “O.” We expect additional business once this release is made public which is slated to be sometime later this year. In the Satellite segment, we are continuing to engage with a large North American conglomerate to build out a satellite terminal for an advanced market in East Asia. Further, we participated in the Satellite 2017 show and see promising business opportunities in the Satellite Terminal Market.  

We continue to invest in creating strategic partnerships and have jointly showcased a ‘Theft protection working prototype’ for automotive parts with Confidex, a world’s leading manufacturer of high-performing contactless solutions for IoT.

Digital Transformation

We continue to work on the several engagements we have in the Digital IT space including Analytics and Intelligent Transport Control Systems. We are strengthening our portfolio of offerings which we have showcased in several global events. Our Smart Mobility solution was featured at the recently concluded TU-Automotive Detroit 2017 and was well received. Our solution will empower OEMs, dealers, fleet owners, insurance, and car rental companies to improve brand loyalty, enhance operational efficiency, and provide better service centre efficiencies. At the IoT world Europe, we demonstrated our Connected Retail solution which will enable In-store recommendation for a traditional retail store using short range wireless technologies. We have built a preliminary version of our Augmented Reality solution for Holo Lens that leverages Vuforia platform from our partner PTC.  This solution targets Automotive service centres and will help service advisors use an AR app coupled with OBD data to diagnose problems efficiently.  We believe these investments will help us gain better market traction over the next few quarters.

My team and I are grateful for the trust reposed in us and wish to assure you of our commitment do our best for all stakeholders.

Rajiv C Mody
Chairman, Managing Director and CEO
Sasken Technologies Limited
(formerly Sasken Communication Technologies Limited)