IPO-bound fintech unicorn Pine Labs has acquired enterprise platform Saluto Wellness Pvt. Ltd for an undisclosed amount.
The company did not comment on any queries regarding transaction value.
Sequoia-backed Pine Labs offers solutions to merchants across sectors such as electronics, food and beverage, fashion, pharmacy, telecom and airlines. In 2019, it had acquired Qwikcilver, a brand through which it offers prepaid, stored value, and gift card solutions to companies in sectors such as e-commerce, fast-moving consumer goods, banking and financial services sector among others.
The deal will help Pine Labs to improve its issuing business Qwikcilver's offerings across employee rewards and recognition, customer loyalty and channel partner programs for medium and large enterprises.
“With Saluto’s platform, we expect to enhance our leadership across enterprise rewards, recognition, incentive and engagement programmes,” Kumar Sudarsan, president - issuing business, Pine Labs, said.
“Their solution, integrated with our offerings, will help us deliver more programs to our existing enterprise clients – resulting in larger and more long-term engagements,” he added.
Founded in 2017 by Siva Kumar and Anoop Nambiar, Bengaluru-based Saluto offers a digital platform to companies to improve engagement with employees, consumers and channel partners. It designs programmes for employee rewards, recognition and wellness, customer referrals, promotions, loyalty, among others.
“Our enterprise solutions are today being used across diverse industry verticals and with this acquisition by Pine Labs, we will be able to scale our business further," said K Siva Kumar, chief executive, Saluto Wellness.
In March 2022, Pine Labs had raised $50 million at a $5 billion valuation from Vitruvian Partners. Prior to that, it had raised around $150 million in a funding round from Alpha Wave Ventures.
The company has since acquired stakes in multiple companies. It acquired Bengaluru-based Setu, an API (application programming interface) infrastructure fintech startup for around $70-75 million in June 2022 and payment solutions provider Mosambee in April 2022.
In February it acquired payments startup Qfix Infocomm, for an undisclosed amount.
The point-of-sale (PoS) major has also invested to scale Plural, its brand for online payments products, to grow beyond offline channels.
Last week, Pine Labs said it has forayed into the United Arab Emirates (UAE) market through partnerships with local banks and financial institutions, expanding in the global footprint beyond India and Malaysia.
