Ion Exchange (India) was formed in 1964 as a subsidiary of the UK’s Permutit and has been fully Indian-owned since 1985. It is a Mumbai-headquartered water and environment solutions company with 8 manufacturing/assembly sites in India, one in Portugal and assembly units in the UAE, Indonesia, Bangladesh and Saudi Arabia. From 1 April 2026 it reports five segments instead of three: Treatment Solutions, Industrial Products, Lifecycle Services, Specialty Chemicals and Consumer Products.

Recent wins include a ~₹503 crore Hyundai Engineering & Construction order (10 Jul 2026, 18-month execution, Middle East filtration units), a 20-year, roughly ₹1,730 crore water and sewage DBOM contract in Oman from Petroleum Development Oman (Feb 2026), and a technology transfer deal with MANN+HUMMEL for PVDF UF membranes (Apr 2026). A new ₹275 crore resin plant at Roha is the biggest capex project; management expects ~4 years to reach full capacity.

FY22-FY24 revenue and PAT are sums of reported quarters; FY25-FY26 are reported figures. Net worth includes minority interest.

Recent quarters

Q1 FY27 revenue rose about 20% year on year, but EBITDA fell to ₹31.8 crore (4.5% margin, versus 10.7% a year earlier) and PAT dropped about 94% to ₹3.1 crore. Specialty Chemicals EBIT halved to ₹22.3 crore as the new Roha plant ran below cost coverage and last year’s forex gains did not repeat. Balance sheet at March 2026: debt ~₹454 crore against cash and bank ~₹319 crore (net debt ~₹135 crore), debtors ~₹1,075 crore (about 134 days of sales) and debt-to-equity of 0.34.

10-year FCFF, WACC 12%, terminal growth 5%. Revenue growth fades from 13% to 7%; EBITDA margin recovers from 7% in FY27E to 10.5% by FY30E (still below the FY25 level); D&A 2.4% of sales; tax 25%; capex 3.5% of sales falling to 2.5%; working capital at 20% of incremental revenue (this business ties up a lot of cash).

Sensitivity (₹ per share)

Even the most generous cell (11% WACC, 6% growth) gives ₹256, well below the market price.

Peer data from Fyers (delayed quotes). Peers are only partial comparables; none combines resins, specialty chemicals and water EPC.

Ion Exchange’s trailing P/E is nearly double Wabag’s, its closest listed water peer, because trailing earnings are depressed. On our FY28E EPS of about ₹12.2 (base case), a 28x multiple (a premium to Wabag, reflecting the chemicals annuity and consumer growth) discounted one year at 12% gives roughly ₹305. At 25x it is ₹271 and at 30x ₹325. We use ₹303 for the relative-valuation value. This is highly dependent on the margin recovery arriving on schedule.

Book value is about ₹91-94 per share and the stock trades at roughly 4.1x book. A justified P/B on a normalised 15% ROE, 12% cost of equity and 5% growth is about 1.4x (₹130). Giving credit for the Roha plant and brand value, we allow up to 2.5x (₹228). Our NAV-based value is ₹180, the midpoint of that range.

Normalised EBITDA margin of 9% on FY26 revenue of ₹2,915 crore gives EBITDA of ₹262 crore, EBIT of ₹192 crore and NOPAT of ₹144 crore. Capitalised at 12%, EV is about ₹1,200 crore, or ~₹73 per share after net debt (₹91 at a 10.5% margin). EPV assumes no growth, so it is a floor and not a target; it shows how much of today’s price is paying for future growth.

Segment EBIT margins are our normalised estimates, not company-disclosed figures; the new five-segment reporting only began in Q1 FY27.

Weights: DCF 30%, Relative 25%, SOTP 25%, EPV 10%, NAV 10%.

A buy case needs two things at once: a price near ₹150-195, and evidence (two or three consecutive quarters) that EBITDA margin is back above 9%.

The growth case is real: the Engineering order book of about ₹2,643 crore and a ₹9,509 crore bid pipeline cover roughly a year of engineering revenue, the ₹503 crore Hyundai order adds to that, and the 20-year Oman DBOM contract gives long-dated annuity-style revenue. Roha resin capacity could reach ₹500-550 crore of sales at 18-24% margins on management’s guidance, though that is expected to take about four years. Consumer Products grew 31% in FY26 but is still loss-making. Treatment Solutions EBIT margin improved to 11.9% in Q1 FY27 from 5.5%, which is encouraging for project quality. The test is conversion of growth into cash and margin, not revenue growth by itself.

Named holders found in public sources (approx. %)

We could not source a verified full top-10 list, so only the holders we found are shown; scheme-level figures may lag the latest quarter. Check BSE/NSE shareholding filings for complete detail.

Ownership is retail-heavy (about 54%) and FII holding has fallen from 5.5% to about 4.9% over six quarters, while mutual funds, almost entirely small-cap schemes, have edged up to 12.5%. Promoters hold 25.4% and have been trimming gradually. Small-cap fund flows can keep the multiple elevated, but they also make the stock vulnerable if those funds rebalance after another weak quarter.