Beyond the watch dial

Summary: KDDL is known for watch dials, but its engineering arm now brings in about four of every Rs 10 of standalone sales, and its stake in a listed retailer is worth most of its market value. This story asks what a KDDL shareholder actually owns. It looks at where each business is strong and what could go wrong, then strips out the retailer to show what the market is paying for the rest.

Summary: KDDL is known for watch dials, but its engineering arm now brings in about four of every Rs 10 of standalone sales, and its stake in a listed retailer is worth most of its market value. This story asks what a KDDL shareholder actually owns. It looks at where each business is strong and what could go wrong, then strips out the retailer to show what the market is paying for the rest. Ask most investors what KDDL makes and they will say watch dials. But in FY26, about four of every Rs 10 of its standalone sales came from something else: ‘Eigen’, a division that makes precision metal parts for electric vehicles, electrical equipment, cars, electronics and aircraft. KDDL also owns just over half of ‘Ethos’, a listed luxury watch retailer. That stake alone is worth nearly 75 per cent of KDDL’s market value. So what does a KDDL shareholder own? A watch-parts maker, an engineering firm or a retailer? The answer decides how to read the stock’s price-to-earnings (P/E) ratio of 47. How KDDL makes money KDDL makes parts that other companies build into their own products. It sells skill more than material: raw material costs only about a quarter of every rupee of standalone sales, and the rest pays for people and machines. Watch components are the largest business, at a little ove