New Delhi: Print media company, DB Corp Limited (DBCL), which is home to flagship newspapers – Dainik Bhaskar, Divya Bhaskar, Divya Marathi and Saurashtra Samachar has announced its financial results for the quarter ended 31 March, 2021.

Despite the strong pandemic led headwinds, the company said its carefully calibrated editorial, circulation and ad revenue strategies continued to help it outperform the industry performance in both circulation as well as ad revenue fronts.

The consolidated profit after tax (PAT) for Q4FY21 grew by 158 per cent YOY at Rs. 619 million as against Rs. 241 million. For Q4, the advertising revenue for Q4 stood at Rs. 3084 million as against Rs. 3303 million, while the circulation revenue stood at Rs. 1104 million as against Rs. 1200 million.

The continued efforts of the circulation teams have yielded results with the Group managing to salvage a challenging year. “The on-ground calibrations done by local teams have helped Dainik Bhaskar achieve almost 95 per cent of pre-Covid levels in select cities and towns. The recoveries have been significant in the key states of Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Gujarat,” it said on Thursday.

The financials results showed that the circulation revenue of the company for FY21 dropped to Rs. 4146 million as against Rs. 5122 million in FY20, while the advertising revenue stood at Rs. 10,084 million as against Rs. 15,640 million.

The total revenue came in at Rs. 15222 million as against Rs. 22363 million the previous fiscal. The EBITDA stood at Rs. 3193 million as against Rs. 4940 million and PAT stood at Rs. 1414 million as against Rs. 2750 million.

“The unprecedented year has reaffirmed the changing dynamics of the Print Industry,” said DB Corp Ltd, managing director, Sudhir Agarwal. “The Indian language newspapers performed significantly better than our English counterparts and outstripped them not only in circulation numbers, but in advertising revenues as well. We are happy to reiterate that the un-metro path chosen by our founder and solidified by the company over the past few years is continuing to fructify. Our digital efforts are also beginning to see traction and we are confident that we will continue to deliver quality journalism through all mediums. The local content has further strengthened the franchise.”

On the advertising front, the Group published over 20 ‘Mega Editions’ across its major markets, despite challenging fiscal, re-affirming its strategy of operating in the Tier-II, Tier-III cities and beyond.