Pine Labs becomes Indian unicorn after Mastercard investment
Indian merchant commerce company Pine Labs has received an undisclosed investment from payments giant Mastercard.
The funding puts Pine Labs at a value of $1.5 billion
The investment is part of a partnership between the two to “continue the rapid growth of convenient electronic payment options for consumers across the region”.
The collaboration will deliver “an extensive range of card and real-time payments-based instalment financing at checkout – in-store and online”.
Though terms have not been disclosed, Time of India reports that the investment sits at around $100-150 million, which sets Pine Labs at a valuation of $1.5 billion.
Founded in 1998, the Indian firm processes payments of $30 billion per year and serves some 140,000 merchants across about 450,000 network points
It has gone through six financing rounds, with two of them coming from corporate backers. Flipkart, India’s largest ecommerce retailer, invested $99 million in the firm back in July 2019.
In 2018 it raised a combined $207 million in rounds supported by PayPal Ventures and Actis among others.
Pine Labs’ shareholders include Sequoia India, which first invested in 2009 and is its largest shareholder at present.
Speaking on the Mastercard deal, Lokvir Kapoor, founder and chairman of Pine Labs, says: “Together, we have a unique opportunity to use Mastercard’s global presence and technology infrastructure to enhance our growth and enable us to meet the growing needs of customers in India and beyond.”
Ari Sarker, co-president for Asia Pacific at Mastercard, adds: “Smart devices are transforming how people shop. With this partnership, we’re continuing to build innovative solutions and provide people with new ways to pay right at their fingertips.
“By joining forces with Pine Labs, we are reinforcing our strategy to deliver choice to consumers and to be the partner of choice for our customers in South Asia and around the world.”
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