Pine Labs receives Singapore Court nod to shift base to India

Merchant commerce and payments platform Pine Labs has received approval from a Singapore court to amalgamate its local entity, Pine Labs Limited (PLS) with its Indian company, Pine Labs Private Limited (PLI).

PLS's whole undertaking including all assets and liabilities shall be transferred and vested in PLI according to the amalgamation agreement, according to PLS’s regulatory filing in Singapore.

All the shareholders of PLS (Singapore entity) will become Pine Labs Private Limited (PLI) shareholders and any pending legal proceedings against PLS shall be continued by PLI after the arrangement.

The filing further states that following the National Company Law Tribunal (NCLT) order filed with the Registrar of Companies, the Singapore entity shall be dissolved without undergoing winding up.

TechCrunch reported the development first.

Pine Labs provides merchants with a variety of products and services, including cloud-connected point-of-sale machines, gifting and credit.

Pine Labs has become the third fintech company after PhonePe and Groww which relocated its domicile to India from overseas. Currently, a clutch of fintech firms including  KreditBee, Razorpay, Meesho, and Zepto have been working on shifting their ultimate holding entities to India. Most recently, Flipkart was in the headlines for shifting its base to India from Singapore.

In April, US-based investment firms Baron Funds and Invesco marked up the valuation of Pine Labs to $5.8 billion and $4.8 billion, respectively. It’s worth noting that the valuation plays a crucial role in deciding the quantum of tax liabilities for shifting the domicile.

Pine Labs has been trying for initial public offerings for the past few years. Last year, it also finalized bankers for the IPO in the US but the attempt didn’t materialize. The firm has not disclosed the timeline of listing on the bourses.

Of late, fintech companies have been laying emphasis to be headquartered in India as regulators’ job become easier as far as diligence and monitoring are concerned. However, the reverse flips require hefty tax liabilities. For context, PhonePe’s investors paid Rs 8,000 crore in taxes to complete the process.