Exclusive: IPO-bound Pine Labs converts to a public company

The public offering of merchant platform company Pine Labs may be sooner than expected. The company has passed a resolution to convert its Singapore-based holding entity from private to public, regulatory filings show.

With this, the company has been renamed from Pine labs Pte to Pine Labs Limited, indicating that the company’s IPO preparation has started to gather momentum. 

According to Entrackr sources, the company is likely to list in the US in the next 10-12 months. While the company hasn’t said anything about the size of the issue and valuation, a TOI report estimates that Pine Labs would eye a $5 billion valuation in the potential IPO.

Its conversion from a private company to a public one has come weeks after the closure of its $600 million funding round at a $3.5 billion valuation. Pine Labs raised $285 million in May and an additional $315 million in July. Sources further said the round was the last private financing for the company.

Queries sent to Pine Labs didn’t elicit any immediate response. We will update the story in case they respond.

Pine Labs would become the fourth fintech company after Paytm, Policybazaar and Mobikwik to get closer to a public listing. The Vijay Shekhar Sharma-led firm is eyeing one of the biggest IPOs at a valuation of $25-30 billion.

It’s worth noting that Pine Labs also facilitated a partial exit of its early and major backer Sequoia Capital via a secondary deal. The VC firm had transferred $225-$230 million worth shares to seven investors including Marshall Wace, Duro Capital, Moore Strategic Ventures and Lenarco Limited.

Entrackr had decoded the secondary deal in August.

According to Fintrackr, Sequoia remains the largest stakeholder in the company with a 25.7% stake while its founder and chairman Lokvir Kapoor is the biggest non-institutional shareholder with 5.05% stake. (See below pie chart for a complete shareholding pattern of the company).

Besides its core offerings of point of sales (PoS) business, the company also offers ‘buy now pay later’ service in India and several overseas markets. It claims to have 95% market share in India and has 100 million customers. In April, the company acquired Malaysia-based payments platform Fave. 

The acquisition facilitated its entry into the e-commerce enablement and consumer payments segments. The company also runs a prepaid gifting platform called QwikCilver in India, Southeast Asia, Middle East, Europe and Australia.