Latest news with #CounterInsurgencyCounterTerrorism

Business Standard

Smallcap defence stock zooms 29% in 2 days despite Q4 loss

Share price of Ideaforge Technology today Shares of Ideaforge Technology moved higher by 20 per cent to ₹463.20 on the BSE in Friday's intra-day trade, extending its previous day's rally, in an otherwise weak market. In the past two trading days, the stock price of this smallcap defence company has zoomed 29 per cent from ₹358.85 on Wednesday. It recovered 54 per cent from its 52-week low of ₹301 touched on April 7, 2025. The stock had hit a 52-week high of ₹864.10 on July 12, 2024. At 01:45 PM; Ideaforge Technology shares was trading 18 per cent higher at ₹456.75, as compared to 1.2 per cent decline in the BSE Sensex. The average trading volumes at the counter jumped over 10-fold. A combined nearly 11 million equity shares changed hands on the NSE and BSE. Catch Stock Market LIVE Updates Today Posted Rs 25.7 crore loss in Q4 Ideaforge Technology reported a net loss of ₹25.7 crore for the quarter ended March 2025 (Q4FY25), due to sharp decline in revenue. The company had posted a net profit of ₹10.3 crore in the year ago quarter. Revenue during the quarter under review dropped 80 per cent to ₹20.3 crore from ₹102.3 crore in Q4FY24, due to a shift in order timelines and delayed government spending. The company reported earnings before interest, tax, depreciation, and amortisation (Ebitda) loss of ₹17.41 crore against profit of ₹20.25 crore. Management commentary FY25 saw a substantial slowdown for the broader drone industry in India, owing to the general elections in the first part and then the slow progress towards procurement initiatives, despite the latent demand. The industry started to regain momentum at the end of the year with the new emergency procurement cycle for Counter Insurgency Counter Terrorism (CICT) operations going into tendering phase in Q4, along with trials of many other civil programs as well towards the end of the same quarter. And thus, while the management did not see closure of opportunities to orderbook in Q4, they now see their healthy progression to the company's L1 pipeline. ALSO READ | With the augmentation of new categories and greater focus on the global markets, the management said the company is seeing increasing momentum towards international opportunities and partnerships. The company intends to substantially increase the market opportunity for Indian drones globally and firmly establish them as a default part of the security, safety, and governance infrastructure of any country, city, or enterprise. Government defence capex The government's defense capex budget has clocked an 8 per cent compounded annual growth rate (CAGR) over FY20-25 and is budgeted to post 13 per cent YoY growth in FY26 to ₹1.8 trillion. This budget is required to fund DPSUs, private defense companies, and import requirements. Potentially, a 10 per cent CAGR in defense capex is expected over the next seven years, and much higher growth is anticipated for defense PSUs over FY25-32. This can be manageable if India's net defense import bill comes down due to increased indigenization and higher exports. However, Motilal Oswal Financial Services believes that if the government agrees to 2-3 bigger deals with other countries, then it will be required to increase the defense capex budget at a much higher rate to meet both domestic PSU growth and immediate requirements via imports. This would depend on several factors, such as the urgency to upgrade the fleet and managing the fiscal deficit, the brokerage firm said in the Hindustan Aeronautics (HAL) company update. ALSO READ | About Ideaforge Technology Ideaforge Technology is the pioneer and the pre-eminent market leader in the Indian unmanned aircraft systems (UAS). The company is backed by leading investors including - Qualcomm, Infosys, Florintree, and other marquee institutional investors. It was ranked 3rd globally in 2024 as a top dual-use (civil & military) drone manufacturer by Drone Industry Insights, the world's leading drone market research and analytics company. Ideaforge has the largest operational deployment of indigenous UAVs across India, with an Ideaforge-manufactured drone taking off every three minutes for surveillance and mapping applications. Ideaforge customers have completed over 650,000+ flights using ideaForge UAVs.