Pine Labs raises $82mn towards network expansion in India

Pine Labs, a digital retail payments platform, announced a funding of USD 82 million to be utilised for accelerating the company's network penetration in India and expand to countries abroad.

Pine Labs is known for its smart, cloud-based payments platform that's designed to reduce costs and drive revenue for retailers. Pine currently processes 450 million transactions worth over USD 15 billion on an annualised basis, helping drive the government's "Digital India" mission.

"We are pleased to welcome Actis as our partner for the next phase of our journey. This investment is a strong endorsement of the value of the merchant-first payments platform that we have built - and the tremendous value Pine Labs brings to the platform's other participants, including shoppers, banks and brands. With this capital, we will accelerate Pine's network penetration in India and expand outside India with our world class technology," said Pine Labs CEO, Lokvir Kapoor.

Merchants across India have historically had to utilise multiple payment terminals to process cards issued by various banks, a situation that created additional costs, clutter and headaches around payments reconciliation. In this regard, Pine Labs created cloud-based software that can be integrated with a generic point of sale (POS) terminal, allowing merchants to accept traditional electronic payment methods such as credit or debit card issued by any bank, as well as e-wallets, QR code payment solutions or other UPI-based solutions, on a single platform.

Pine's cloud-based platform also enabled the company to create and deploy additional innovative products for retailers, including targeted customer-engagement campaigns; consumer analytics; and in-store consumer financing for partner brands that can be tailored to customers at the point of sale. This consumer financing product, which connects the merchant, the credit card company, the brand and the consumer in real time at the point of sale, has facilitated more than USD 1 billion in consumer credit on an annualised basis.

The latest products in Pine Labs' portfolio include electronic gift cards, and a pay-by-points product that spans major card loyalty programs. Pine Labs has also partnered with NBFCs to rapidly scale up the merchant lending business.

The company, which handles approximately 15 percent of India's cashless transactions in physical retail stores, is currently deployed at approximately 300,000 payment acceptance terminals, and aims to reach one million payment acceptance points in India in the next three to five years.

On the international front, Pine Labs in 2017 had entered Malaysia with an exclusive partnership with one of their leading banks. The company, which is in talks with over a dozen international banks, now aims to expand to other new markets across Asia and the Middle East.

On a related note, the current funding round was led by Actis Capital and joined by Altimeter Capital, a new investor.