Peerless Group to invest Rs 1,000 cr in capex; focuses on hospital, realty

economictimes.indiatimes.com:

Peerless Group on Monday announced ambitious plans to invest over Rs 1,000 crore in capital expenditure over the next three years, a major portion of which will be channelled into the development of hospital and real estate projects. In the financial year 2022-23, the Peerless Group reported a revenue of Rs 635 crore from operations. This notable increase of 22 per cent over the previous fiscal's revenue of Rs 520 crore has been seen as a successful outcome of the company's transformation efforts undertaken last year, the company said.

«While transformation is a long journey, during the last year, we have seen early results. Before Covid, our annual growth rate of revenue for the entire group used to be around 6 per cent. During FY23, we have been able to shift the growth rate to 22 per cent,» said Peerless Chairman Partha Bhattacharyya.

Profit before tax during FY'23 was Rs 196 crore against Rs 149 crore achieved in FY'22. The group's flagship Peerless General Finance & Investment Company (PGFI) obtained the license of a Non-Banking Financial Company — Investment and Credit Company (NBFC-ICC) from the Reserve Bank of India during the year. This license replaces the Residuary Non-Banking Finance Company (RNBC) license, signalling a new phase of growth and expansion for the group, according to Peerless MD Jayanta Roy.

He said profitability with topline will be the mantra of the group. He added that most of the group entities have turnarounds like hotels which posted a net surplus. It will invest about Rs 100 crore in renovation for the Kolkata property.