After claiming that “Jobs Are Back” in an advertisement that Info Edge (India) ran for its job portal Naukri.com, it is now claiming, at the end of during the Jan-March 2010 quarter, that “Growth is back”. Net sales for the quarter for the company were up 13.1 percent year-on-year, and 10.84 percent sequentially, following two quarters of negative growth and one flat quarter. Readers should keep in mind that, traditionally, Q4 is traditionally the strongest quarter for Info Edge in terms of sales, as recruiters spend their budgets on annual contracts.

Info Edge also accounts its sales in a staggered manner through the year, as we had explained last year. In what is clearly a positive signal for the coming quarters, the company says its deferred sales revenue increased, to Rs 531 mn as on March 31st, 2010 as against Rs 494 mn in March 31st, 2009.

Net Profit for the quarter, however, was down both year-on-year (4.24 percent) and sequentially (15.36 percent), as expenditure on both employees, and advertising and promotion increased substantially. The “Jobs are back” advertisement (on YouTube) must have cost a bomb to run.

Correction: PAT at Rs 132.23 mn decreased by 4.23% over the corresponding quarter in FY2008-09, due to “an exceptional item amounting to Rs 37.74 million on account of estimated dimunition in value of investment in Study Places Inc.” Read about the Study Places sale here, and our Deal updates here.

Operating EBITDA increased by 19.5% at Rs 215.81 million over the corresponding quarter in FY2008-09. EBITDA is at Rs 280.6 mn compared to Rs 245.15 mn being 14.46% increase over corresponding quarter in FY 08-09

Their press release also purposefully states that Other Income was Rs 64.79 mn for the quarter, marginally up compared to the corresponding quarter last year. But it still remains that ‘Other Income’ accounts for around 45 percent of the companys profit. Investraction had raised the flag on Info Edge’s ‘Other Income’ and EPS in December last year. All in all, including sales, other income and other income, the company reported total Income in Q4-10 at Rs 717.37 Mn, an 11.8% increase over the corresponding quarter in FY09.

Other Verticals

Info Edge has been saying for long that Jeevansathi is expected to break even at the end of FY10, but there isn’t sufficient clarity on that (will be asked about in the conference call). According to the company: “99 acres (real estate portal) continued to be in investment mode during the quarter however, the losses reduced. Other verticals apart from Naukri.com and Quadrangle (including 99acres.com, Jeevansathi.com) incurred an EBITDA loss of Rs 23.74 mn as compared to Rs 58.03 mn for the same quarter last year. Jeevansathi.com and 99acres.com have achieved a growth in Revenues at 12.4% and 38.8% respectively.