Moloy Banerjee, South Asia Head - gases at Linde India, on Tuesday, said that 2021 was a good year for the company on the back of a surge in COVID-related oxygen. However, the oxygen demand has gone away. Infact, in Q4 of the calendar year, there was pick-up in industrial gases.

He said, "I must say that 2021 has been a pretty good year for us. Some of it has been on the back of surge in oxygen demand, which was largely due to the COVID pandemic. Hopefully, that won't happen in the future."

"When we moved into Q4 of the calendar year, a lot of the COVID-related oxygen demand had gone away and a lot of the industrial demand pickup started happening and that is something that we are seeing is doing well. Our gases business, to a large extent, is connected to steel, fabrication and manufacturing, auto industry and then to some extent, pharma and healthcare - pharma and healthcare was driving all the gas sales in Q2 and Q3 of this year," Banerjee explained.

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He mentioned that he expects 7-10 percent growth for the company in the next year. He said, "As far as the guidance for next year is concerned, I think we had a drastic run in 2021. To a large extent it was driven by the huge surge in sales that happened due to the COVID pandemic - oxygen was the talk of the town at that time, and we had huge amounts of oxygen sales."

He added, "So we had a very high base effect in 2021. What we will probably do in 2022, is to hold on to the volumes. I don't think we will see a huge growth, but I would still think that we would have anywhere between 7-10 percent of growth on our topline next year."

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On capex plans, Banerjee said that the company has committed investments of around Rs 500 crore and is also looking at further investments.

"If you see our plant loadings currently are at 75 to 80 percent levels across the country, which is a good spot to be in and that sets the stage for us to look for further investments. Clearly, we are looking at that," he said.

"As we speak, we have already committed ourselves to investments worth almost Rs 500 crore or thereabouts and we definitely see a pipeline of at least another Rs 500 crore of investments that we would like to undertake going forward in India," he added.

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On green hydrogen business, he said that it’s happening outside India, however the same hasn’t fructified in India so far.

Banerjee said, "We are definitely there in the green hydrogen business, it is one of the core areas for us. A lot of the work that is currently happening in green hydrogen is happening outside of India."

"Right now in India, there is a lot of chatter around it and there is a lot of potential that we see but I don't think things are fructifying. In Korea, Japan, Australia, Europe, projects are actually happening on the ground, but in India, it's more of a potential. Linde is definitely clued on to it, I think we will wait to see how it develops in India," he explained.

For the entire interview, watch the accompanying video.

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