How do you prefer to make your payments? We bet most of your answers would be either debit or credit cards, UPI or any other form of digital payment. Cashless transactions have become so seamless that most people now avoid carrying huge amounts of cash for payments. However, the digital payment space was not always like this.
Pine Labs became the pioneer in developing an easy digital payment platform in India and made payments easy and quick, benefiting both customers and merchants. During the 2000s, there was a gap between banks, merchants & customers and the market needed someone who could bridge this gap. This is where Pine Labs came in.
🌲 How Does Pine Labs Work?
Even if you had not heard about this company, you would have used their service at some point. The company provides finance and last-mile retail transaction technology to merchants. They make and sell Point of Sale (PoS) machines and create software for these machines. The handy card-swiping machines in various shops and big retail outlets are called PoS machines.
They generate most of their revenue from the sale of these machines and also through commissions on the payments made using their services. Some of the services this company provides are e-wallets, cashback programmes, instant EMIs and loyalty solutions.
🌐 Capturing The Market
The company solved the payment problem for customers and the collection problem for merchants. Thanks to Pine Labs, retailers can now collect payments with less complexity and at a lower cost.
Currently, the company offers services to over 150,000 merchants across 3,700 cities across India and Malaysia. With the help of convenient digital payments, merchants have successfully boosted their revenues due to the ease of transactions enjoyed by their customers.
👣 How It All Began
Initially, the company focused on developing a card-based payment and loyalty programme for the retail petroleum industry. Later, they tapped into the mainstream payment space in 2009 when they partnered with banks to create a payment platform for merchants.
By 2017, the company had broken national borders by partnering with CIMB Bank to enter the Malaysian market. The company is evolving into an all-around global merchant platform, providing various services.
🔮 The Future of Pine Labs
In its next phase of diversification, the company plans to start loan packages with insurance for merchants in partnership with banks and NBFCs.
Pine Labs became a unicorn startup in 2020 after getting funded by the American financial services giant Mastercard. The company is now eyeing an IPO opportunity. Furthermore, they also plan to get listed on the NASDAQ stock market.