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Mastek Ltd>
  • CMP : 2,524.0 Chg : -46.40 (-1.81%)
  • Target : 1,520.0 (10.32%)
  • Target Period : 12-18 Month

18 Jan 2023

Business in core markets continues to face headwinds

About The Stock

Mastek Ltd (Mastek) offers data, apps, cloud services to public & private enterprise in the UK, US, Middle East, Asia Pacific and India.

  • The company’s recent acquisition of Evosys has enabled Mastek to provide end-to-end solutions and improves margins from ~14% to 21%
 
  • Net debt free and healthy double digit return ratio (with RoCE of 20%)
Q3FY23 Results:

Reported weak organic growth in Q3.

  • Revenue grew 3.1% QoQ in CC terms with flat organic growth while in dollar terms revenue grew 2.6% QoQ
  • EBITDA margin was flat sequentially at 17.3%
  • Reported 12M order backlog of US$206.2 mn, up 10.2%QoQ
What should Investors do?

Mastek’s share price has grown by ~4.1x over the past five years (from ~₹ 414 in January 2018 to ~₹ 1,695 levels in January 2023).

  • We change our rating on the stock from HOLD to REDUCE
Target Price and Valuation

We value Mastek at ₹ 1,520 i.e. 13x P/E on FY25E EPS.

Key Triggers for future price performance
  • Growth in new logo acquisition, increasing deal size, expansion of sales & marketing and market share gains to drive revenues
  • Management change in the US region may help it to grow stronger & achieve desired revenue mix
  • Acquisition of MST Solutions will help drive growth in the US region
  • Expect revenues to grow at 8.2% CAGR in FY22-25E
Alternate Stock Idea:

Apart from Mastek, in our IT coverage we also like Infosys.

  • Key beneficiary of improved digital demand, industry leading revenue growth & healthy capital allocation prompt us to be positive

 

  • BUY with a target price of ₹ 1,730

Key Financial Summary

Particulars FY20 FY21 FY22 5 Year CAGR(FY17-FY22) FY23E FY24E FY25E 3 Year CAGR (FY22-FY25E)
Net Sales 1,071.5 1,721.9 2,183.8 31.3 2,265.9 2,524.6 2,767.6 8.2
EBITDA 155.4 364.5 462.5 57.0 407.9 462.0 517.6 3.8
EBITDA Margins (%) 14.5 21.2 21.2 - 18.0 18.3 18.7 -
Net Profit 133.0 209.4 295.1 55.5 263.5 310.7 349.1 5.8
EPS (|) 52.4 81.9 103.8 - 87.6 103.3 116.1 -
P/E 32.3 20.7 16.3 - 19.3 16.4 14.6 -
RoNW (%) 16.8 24.4 27.5 - 20.5 20.1 19.1 -
RoCE (%) 11.3 21.5 26.7 - 21.2 21.3 20.7 -
Source: Company, ICICI Direct Research

Key takeaways of quarter and conference call highlights

  • The company reported growth of 3.1% QoQ growth in CC term while dollar revenue came in at US$80.1 mn, up 2.6% QoQ with full quarterly revenue contribution of Metasoftech Solutions LLC, US (MST). The company indicated that the organic revenue growth was flattish, implying a weak performance of organic business in YTD December 2022. In rupee terms, revenue was at | 658.7 crore, up 5.3% QoQ

 

  • Geography wise UK (58.9% of the mix) reported muted growth of 0.1% QoQ while growth was driven by the US (27.8% of mix, up 360 bps QoQ) reporting growth of 21.2% QoQ. Growth was aided by full quarter contribution of MST. ME region also reported steady 10.6% sequential growth

 

  • Vertical wise government (41.4% of the mix) reported growth of 3.2% QoQ while financial services, health and manufacturing & tech reported growth of 13.3%, 14.4% & 8.2%, respectively. Retail sector revenue declined 6% QoQ while the company indicated that retail segment was impacted due to weakness in some clients due to macro headwinds & impact of furloughs

 

  • The company reported flattish EBITDA margin of 17.3% compared to Q2. Mastek indicated that though the supply side challenges have started to ease out, margins were impacted by continuance of sub-contractor expenses as per the requirement of UK NHS business and onetime provision for certain doubtful debts

 

  • The company indicated that it expects EBITDA margins to improve from Q4 onwards and indicated that the operating margin levers will be easing of supply side challenges due to lower attrition and increase in utilisation as freshers are being deployed on projects. The company indicated that it is aiming for high teens margin for FY24 in the range of 17-19%. Mastek also indicated that since it is targeting high growth in revenues in the medium term it will invest the additional margins earned above 19% back in business

 

  • The company indicated that the organic health business in UK, which is contributed majorly by NHS, is still under stress due to a change in leadership at the organisation level and shortage of workers. Mastek indicated that pain in the business is likely to sustain in the next two to three quarters. The company indicated that it lost budgeted revenue potential of ~US$24 mn in NHS business till YTD December 2022. Mastek also indicated that it has been taking a few steps to mitigate the issue it is facing in NHS business by diversifying into other department verticals wherein it also won three deals but the ramp up for the same is yet to happen

 

  • In the US organic business, the company indicated that its progress was below expectations as there was a delay in client mining & order booking. The company also indicated that performance was impacted due to the discontinuing of CX business by Oracle. However, on the inorganic front, the acquisition of MST has accelerated its overall growth in the US region. The company indicated that MST operates mainly in the health, government & manufacturing verticals and as the integration progresses it is witnessing cross-sell opportunities among the MST & Mastek’s client. The company also indicated that it looking to grow aggressively in the US region both on the organic and inorganic front and expects a quarterly revenue run rate to hit US$24-25mn in Q4FY23

 

  • In the Middle East region, the company indicated that it is witnessing increased traction after the Russia-Ukraine border conflict started. Mastek indicated that it is seeing increased demand for its services in the health segment in the Saudi Arabia and Dubai regions. The company indicated that it is looking to cut the tail of long clients, looking to focus on top 20-25 clients here and cut out low margin business here

 

  • The company indicated that its 12M backlog has increased by 10.2% QoQ to US$206.2 mn while in CC terms the growth was 5.3%. Mastek indicated that the demand momentum has picked up at the end of the Q3 and the deals that were delayed in H1 are getting closed. The company also indicated that it has closed four to five deals of US$5 mn+. Also, the Oracle pipeline in the US & ME region is looking strong. The company also indicated that since the macro environment has deteriorated compared to last year, clients are reprioritising the cost optimisation & efficiency deals over discretionary spending along with breaking the large size deals into smaller ones. The company indicated that this will also help it to win some deals in future and provides a stable outlook in the medium term driven by growth in the UK & US regions

 

  • The company added 31 new clients in this quarters taking the total client’s addition for 9MFY23 to 84. The company indicated that out of the 31 clients that it added, six have more than US$1bn annual revenues. It will also provide them an opportunity to further strengthen their wallet share with them

 

  • The company’s LTM attrition continue to moderate. In Q3, the LTM attrition declined by 90 bps QoQ to 23.3% as the supply side challenges are easing out. Mastek indicated that utilisation declined by 120 bps QoQ to 73.7%. The company indicated that it aims to improve the utilisation to the level of 75-78% and will be one of the key levers for margin improvement

 

  • The company’s net headcount during the quarter declined by 123 taking the total headcount to 5,687 employees. Mastek indicated that the drop in employees was due to backfilling of open positions by internal realignments. The company indicated that it had hired good chunk of fresher in H1FY23 and after training they are being deployed in the projects in a gradual manner. It also indicated that it plans to make leadership changes in the US region and hire a sales team to ramp up the sales opportunity in the region

 

  • The company mentioned that during the quarter it made a strategic investment in VolteoEdge, a SaaS company with an Enterprise ready Edge Intelligence Platform that works on data & connected devices for data extraction. The company indicated that these solutions along with the company’s will provide prospective solution for ServiceNow clients

 

  • The company mentioned that during the quarter it has purchased 33,446 CCPS of its subsidiary for a consideration of | 120 crore. Mastek further indicated that the consideration is to be paid by | 40 crore in cash with balance | 80 crore by issuing equity shares

 

  • The company declared an interim dividend of | 7 per share and announced that record date for determining the eligible shareholders for payment of dividend will be February 1, 2023
 
Variance Analysis
 
   Q3FY23   Q3FY22   YoY (%)   Q2FY22   QoQ (%)  Comments
Revenue in USD mn 80.1 73.6 8.8 78.1 2.6 Revenue growth of 3.1% QoQ in CC terms with organic growth remaining flat
Revenue 658.7 551.9 19.3 625.3 5.3  
Employee expense 346.4 273.2 26.8 340.0 1.9  
             
Gross Margin 312.3 278.8 12.0 285.3 9.5  
Gross margin (%) 47.4 50.5 -310 bps 45.6 179 bps  
Other expense 198.6 162.5 22.2 177.9 11.6  
             
EBITDA 113.7 116.2 -2.2 107.4 5.9  
EBITDA Margin (%) 17.3 21.1 -380 bps 17.2 0 bps EBITDA margin remains flat sequntially as sub-contract cost continues as per business specific requirements & one time provision of doubtful debts
Depreciation & amortisation 19.6 10.6 85.7 17.1 14.6 D&A increased on account of increased amotization of MST acquisition 
EBIT 94.1 105.7 -10.9 90.3 4.2  
EBIT Margin (%) 14.3 19.1 -486 bps 14.4 -15 bps  
Other income (less interest) -2.2 4.1 -153.4 1.7 -233.1  
PBT 91.9 109.8 -16.3 92.0 -0.1  
Tax paid 24.8 26.4 -6.0 31.1 -20.3  
PAT 67.1 83.4 -19.6 86.2 -22.1 PAT in Q2 was higher on account exceptional gain on sale of asset

Disclaimer

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pankaj.pandey@icicisecurities.com

 

 

ICICI Direct Research Desk,

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