Defence Tech OEM Tonbo Imaging Plans IPO via ₹18 Million Share OFS

Tonbo Imaging Limited, a global defence electronics original equipment manufacturer (OEM), has filed its Draft Red Herring Prospectus (DRHP) with market regulator the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI).

The company’s initial public offering comprises an Offer for Sale (OFS) of up to 18,085,246 equity shares of face value ₹2 each.

The Offer for Sale comprises 1,960,000 equity shares by Promoter Selling Shareholders, 339,700 equity shares by the Promoter Group Selling Shareholder, and 15,635,046 equity shares by Investor Selling Shareholders.

Founded in 2003 by technologists with prior experience at the U.S. Department of Defense and Sarnoff Corporation, Tonbo Imaging transitioned into a defence-focused product manufacturing company in 2012 following the buyout by its promoters. The company is promoted by Arvind Lakshmikumar, Ankit Kumar and Cecilia D’Souza. The promoters have been together for two decades and bring together a wealth of experience in global defence programs product engineering and capital raising.

Marquee investors who are invested in the company include Qualcomm Ventures, Artiman, Edelweiss Value, Celesta Capital II LP, HBL Engineering, Tenacity Ventures, India Exim Bank and Florintree.

As per the F&S Report in its DRHP, Tonbo Imaging is the fastest-growing defence technology player in India in terms of revenue, EBITDA and PAT margin growth (CAGR FY23–FY25) among listed peers. During the same period, it was also the largest manufacturer by sales value of thermal imaging systems supplied to government and defence agencies in India.

In FY25, the company accounted for 93% of India’s thermal imaging exports, positioning it as the largest exporter of such systems from the country. It serves a diversified customer base including global militaries, law enforcement agencies, homeland security organisations and global defence OEMs.

The company designs, develops and manufactures International Traffic in Arms Regulations (U.S.) free advanced sensing, processing, communication and guidance systems for surveillance, reconnaissance, targeting and control applications. It is evolving from standalone tactical systems to integrated autonomous platform solutions, combining multiple hardware and software subsystems for battlefield deployment.

Its diversified product portfolio is broadly classified into tactical systems and platform systems, spanning the electromagnetic spectrum from visible imaging to long-wave infrared and multi-sensor imaging and includes thermal imaging cores, weapon sights, hand-held thermal imaging binoculars, targeting systems, missile seekers, fire control systems and missile guidance systems, enabling autonomy on the battlefield.

Its offering emphasises on miniaturisation, low size-weight-and-power (SWaP) designs, modular payloads and AI-enabled image processing, with applications across remote weapon stations, missile seekers, ISR platforms, armoured vehicles and soldier-wearable systems. Its mission is to assist, augment and replace humans on the battlefield.

As on June 30,2025 it has over 20,000 systems deployed across 24 countries.

The company is among the few Indian defence players with 100% ownership of its intellectual property, spanning optics, embedded software and electronics, with no dependence on external technology partners. It operates an asset-light model, retaining core design and IP ownership while outsourcing manufacturing to certified electronics manufacturing services (EMS) partners such as Kaynes Technology India Limited and Avalon Technology and Services Private Limited though all prototype development, system integration, and qualification testing are conducted in-house.

As of September 30, 2025, it had an order book of ₹ 2,665.70 million. Additionally between October 1, 2025 to November 30, 2025, it has received orders aggregating to ₹ 716.80 million.

For the three months ended June 30, 2025, revenue from operations stood at ₹686.77 million, with India contributing ₹632.86 million, accounting for 92.15% of total revenue, while the rest of the world (Middle East/Africa) contributed ₹41.70 million, representing 6.07%; Europe and Asia accounted for ₹3.19 million (0.46%) and ₹7.69 million (1.12%), respectively, during the quarter, while profit after tax (PAT) for the period was ₹54.31 million, with a PAT margin of 7.68%.

In Fiscal 2025, revenue from operations increased to ₹4,690.80 million, with Europe emerging as the largest contributor at ₹3,065.18 million, accounting for 65.34% of total revenue, followed by India at ₹1,570.44 million (33.48%), Asia at ₹7.69 million (0.16%) and the United States at ₹0.51 million (0.01%), while PAT stood at ₹727.60 million, reflecting a PAT margin of 15.34%.

Revenue from overseas customers rose to ₹3,073.38 million in Fiscal 2025, accounting for 65.52% of revenue from operations, compared to ₹2,081.46 million (48.61%) in Fiscal 2024 and ₹180.64 million (18.66%) in Fiscal 2023. For the three months ended June 30, 2025, revenue from customers located outside India stood at ₹44.89 million, representing 6.54% of revenue from operations.

Some of its key projects include developing airborne systems with high performance EO/IR gimbal for an Indian defence R&D organisation, a multi-spectral infrared seeker and command launcher unit with advanced computer vision capabilities for a defence manufacturing company and a cost-effective, FSO communication system suitable for terrestrial and naval applications, addressing the limitations of current FSO technologies in challenging environments for Indian armed forces.

JM Financial Limited and IIFL Capital Services Limited are the Book Running Lead Managers to the issue.