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Grindwell Norton loss at Rs 50 lakh

BANGALORE: Grindwell Norton Ltd (GNL), which has been given an `A1+' rating by ICRA for its planned short-term debt of Rs 25 crore, has incurred a loss of Rs 50 lakh during the quarter ended March 31, 2001.

The company, which had implemented a voluntary retirement scheme for its plants at Mora in Maharashtra and at its head office, had recorded a profit-before-tax of Rs 4.3 crore during the same period last year.

The loss for the current quarter was on account of the Rs 4.6 crore extraordinary expense towards the VRS implemented in February this year. However, this performance is not strictly comparable with the same period in 2000 due to a strike at the Mora pla nt during February last, an ICRA release said.

GNL, a 51 per cent subsidiary of Saint Gobain, has recorded a one per cent drop in sales Rs 47.2 crore during the first quarter of this year compared to Rs 47.6 crore during the same period last year. The company had changed its accounting year to Januar y-December during 2000 to bring it in line with the accounting year of Saint Gobain.

GNL's sales registered only a small growth of one per cent to Rs 152.1 crore during the nine-month period of April-December 2000 compared to Rs 150.8 crore achieved during the same period in the previous year.

The net profit, however, improved by six per cent to Rs 10.9 crore during this period from Rs 10.3 crore. The return on capital also improved marginally to 15.73 per cent as on December 2000 as against 15.61 per cent as on March 2000.

With no major plans or additional investments in Saint Gobain ventures in the near future, ICRA expects GNL to maintain the conservative gearing (total debt/tangible net worth ratio of 0.22 times as on December 31, 2000). -- Our Bureau