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Anuj Suvarna
 
NEW DELHI: Initial public offering (IPO)-bound payment solutions provider Pine Labs on Wednesday said it has raised $50 million, or about ₹380 crore, in a fresh funding from Vitruvian Partners.
 
Vitruvian is a growth capital firm headquartered in London, currently investing from its fourth €4.0 billion (around $4.45 billion) and has backed over 45 companies. It has assets under management of approximately €10 billion (around $11.11 billion).
 
The firm's investments include Just Eat, Farfetch, Darktrace, Trustpilot, Marqeta, TransferWise, Global-e and Skyscanner.
 
“We aim to further strengthen our recent foray in online payments via Plural and take our Buy Now Pay Later offering to new markets through strategic collaborations," said B. Amrish Rau, CEO, Pine Labs.
 
“Our investment in Pine Labs follows several investments we have made into the digital payments space, and we’re excited to partner with the management team as they continue to drive digital transformation within the rapidly growing Indian payments market. We were impressed by the versatility of the omnichannel payments platform, as well as the expanding geographic footprint," said Peter Read, Partner at Vitruvian Partners.
 
Queries on the firm’s valuation went unanswered till the report was published.
 
However, the Economic Times reported that the said transaction could have valued the financial technology unicorn at just over $5 billion.
 
VCCircle had earlier reported that Pine Labs may defer the IPO process till later this year due to "weak market sentiments".
 
It was planning to launch its Nasdaq listing process in January-February, and had hired Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley to formalise the process. However, it may now postpone the IPO launch till the end of the current year or even early 2023 due to unfavourable market conditions, and instead, focus on international expansion to add on revenue and better its margins, two persons familiar with the development told VCCircle.
 
Last month, Pine Labs raised $150 million (about ₹1,120 crore) from Alpha Wave Ventures.
 
In May 2021, the company raised a tranche of $285 million from a clutch of reputed public market-focused cross-over funds, pushing its valuation to around $3 billion.
 
In August 2021, Pine Labs roped in CRED founder Kunal Shah on its board.
 
Last year, Pine Labs raised a total of $600 million from US-based asset management firm Fidelity, Blackrock and others, followed by a $100 million fundraise from US-based Invesco Developing Markets Fund.
 
Having launched the payments company in 1998, Rajul Garg left the firm in 2003. Current chairman Lokvir Kapoor had then taken over.
 
Pine Labs’ solutions are used by merchants from across industries such as electronics, food and beverage, fashion, pharmacy, telecom and airlines, but these are mostly offline players. The company is also planning to ramp up its online platform, both by organic and inorganic means.
 
Pine Labs has also been active in M&A (mergers and acquisitions), it has struck a few acquisitions in the recent past. In February it acquired out payments startup Qfix Infocomm, for an undisclosed amount. Earlier, Mint reported that Pine Labs is in advanced negotiations to acquire API infrastructure company Setu.
 
Pine Labs previously acquired QwikCilver in 2019 for which it raised capital from Actis Advisors.
 
In the past the platform acquired Southeast Asia-based fintech platform Fave for $45 million (₹337 crore) in April 2021. In July 2020, Pine Labs made a strategic investment in Fave.