Nitco Share price and Fundamental Analysis

Company History

Nitco Ltd is an India-based company. The company is engaged in the manufacture and marketing of ceramic tiles (wall and floor), Naturoc (gres porcelain tiles), vitrified tiles, marble, as well as real estate development. They are having their manufacturing unit located in Alibaug (Maharashtra) with an installed capacity of 0.18 million metric tons per annum. They have over 800 dealers, 18 sales and marketing offices and 23 warehouses. The company is also engaged in real estate development through their wholly owned subsidiary Nitco Realties Pvt Ltd.

The company has three product segments, namely Vitrified tiles, which sources tiles from Chinese manufacturers and manufactures gres porcelain tiles; Ceramic tiles, which includes diverse product mix of ceramic tiles, including glossy, matt, wood, metal, stone, leather, rustic, dirt-free and glazed aqua finishes, and Marble, which sources multiple shades and patterns from Italy and other countries.

Nitco Ltd was incorporated on July 25, 1966 as a private limited company with the name Nitco Tiles Pvt Ltd. The company started their operations with a mosaic tile manufacturing facility at Thane in the state of Maharashtra having an initial capacity of 0.6 mn sq feet per annum. In the year 1984, they started their operations in Kanjur Marg for import, processing and distribution of marble in India.

In March 1995, the company started setting up the Greenfield plant to manufacture ceramic floor tiles at an approx. cost of Rs 900 million at Alibaug, Maharashtra. In January 25, 1996, the company was converted into public limited company and the name was changed to Nitco Tiles Ltd. In the year 1997, they started full-scale commercial production at Alibaug, Maharashtra with a capacity of 10000 sq. mts. per day.

In the year 2001, Mahalaxmi Tiles & Marble Company Pvt Ltd, engaged in the business of manufacture of mosaic tiles merged with the company, which increased their total capacity to 7.4 mn sq ft per annum. Also, Cospar Impex Pvt Ltd, which was engaged in import of marble, merged with the company.

In the year 2002, the company set up a unit in Silvassa for processing and sale of imported marble. They made a tie up with Nanhai Shangyuan Oulian Construction Ceramics Co Ltd (now known as Foshan Chancheng Oulian Construction Ceramic Company Ltd, manufacturer of vitrified tiles from China) and Prestige General Trading (Dubai, the exporter of said vitrified tiles) for sourcing their entire requirement of vitrified tiles from them.

In the year 2004, the company started manufacturing paving tiles. Also, they upgraded Alibaug plant for manufacturing Porcelain tiles. During the year 2005-06, the company increased production capacity of Mosaic Tiles from 84.86 sq ft to 90.88 sq ft. In March 2006, they installed six windmills of 7.5 MW capacity at Dhule in Maharashtra. Also, they increased ceramic floor tile capacity by 56% and commissioned in May 2006.

During the year 2006-07, the company introduced innovative products, namely Timberland, Metallica, Steps and Risers, Dholpur Series, Slate Stone Series, Estonia, Matrix, Pietre Del Sol, Art Stone, Innova and African Slate. In May 2006, they undertook a capacity expansion in premium tiles of 22.80 lakh sq met per annum at Alibaug factory.

During the year, the company appointed an additional outsourcing partner for vitrified tiles in China, facilitating scale and derisking. They incorporated Realties Pvt Ltd as a wholly owned subsidiary company to carry out real estate activities.

During the year 2007-08, the company launched several innovative products in Ceramic and Vitrified tiles categories. In Ceramic tiles, they launched Metallica, Innova Series, Vintage Series, Estonia Series, Breton Stone Series, Timberland Series, Matrix Series, Country Series and Ethinica. In Vitrified tiles, they launched Orient White, Java, Taiga, Florence, Viva, Milano and Murano.

During the year, the company commenced construction of two IT parks in Thane and a premium residential project in Worli. They launched 12 Le Studios across major Indian cities. During the year 2008-09, the company commissioned the new plant for the manufacture of premium Gres Porcelain Tiles-Naturoc.

Initially, the company manufactured mosaic tiles. Over the year, they have added several new products namely marble, ceramic tiles, vitrified tiles, cement, etc., and have built a strong distribution network which caters to the building construction industry. Subsequently, the company changed their name from Nitco Tiles Ltd to Nitco Ltd with effect from July 10, 2008.

During the year 2009-10, the company launched new brand 'NATUROC', a superior quality gres porcelain floor tiles manufactured for the first time in India and also launched a large collection of wall tiles. They installed an automatic palletiser to reduce handling breakages Embarked on the co-generation of 5.5 MW. The company invested in a marble quarry through a wholly owned subsidiary in Turkey.

In January 2011, the company commissioned 5.5 MW co-generation captive power plant (supplied by Turbomach S A, Switzerland) at their ceramic tile manufacturing facility at Alibaug in Maharashtra. Also, the expansion at the state-of-the-art marble processing plant at Silvassa was completed during the financial year 2010-11.