Drone maker ideaforge Technology's peak revenue potential is 2-3 times the current revenue, said the company's Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Ankit Mehta in a conversation with CNBC-TV18 on Friday, July 7. "At peak levels, we should comfortably be able to cross 2-3 times the current revenue as the orders pipeline build in over the next few years timeframe,” Mehta said.

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The ideaforge Technology CEO said the sustainable EBITDA margin will be in the 30-40 percent range. "If you look at FY23, then the adjusted EBITDA numbers were hovering around 45 percent. So, the adjusted numbers should help us understand the overall scenario in terms of what the EBITDA margin should look like going forward,” he noted.

Mehta also said the operating cash flows in FY22 were positive and that the company does not see a challenging environment on the cash flow front currently. “Operating cash flows in the year before were positive. Overall, we have not seen very challenging times in terms of cash flows recently, particularly because the chunkiness is what sometimes causes the cashflow negativity, but then it fills up quite fast as well… the moment we get the credits back.”

“We should expect the working capital days to hover around 200 days, which is more likely the overall benchmark, but on a snapshot, it may look different from time to time,” Mehta said.

ideaForge shares settled lower after a remarkable market debut in early trade on Friday amid profit-taking at the counter. The stock began trade at Rs 1,305.10, reflecting a steep jump of 94.21 percent from the issue price of Rs 672 on the BSE.

During today's trading session, the stock jumped to a day’s high of Rs 1,344. However, profit-taking at the counter pushed the stock down and it ended lower at Rs 1,295.50 apiece, down by 0.74 percent from the opening price. On the NSE, shares of the Mumbai-based firm started the trade at Rs 1,300, witnessing a sharp uptick of 93.45 percent.

The Rs 567.24-crore initial public offering (IPO) of ideaForge, which had a price range of Rs 638-672 a share, last week was subscribed an eye-popping 106.05 times.

Founded in 2007, the company has the largest operational deployment of indigenous unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) across India. ideaForge has been backed by several marquee ventures and private equity investors, including Qualcomm Asia, Infosys and Celesta Capital.

The drone maker’s customers include the armed forces, central police forces, state police departments, disaster management forces, forest departments and civil customers. JM Financial and IIFL Securities were the managers to the issue.

(Edited by : Shoma Bhattacharjee)