Pine Labs acquires loyalty Startup Fave for a sum of $ 45 Mn

Merchant payments startup Pine Labs announced Tuesday that it will acquire Fave, a Singapore-based cashback startup, for $ 45 million, targeting the growing consumer payments category in India and Southeast Asia.

Fave`s investors will receive cash payments in full, while Founders and Principal Fave employees will receive cash and Pine Labs stock.

Fave will launch its Consumer Loyalty offerings in India with a new app, bringing Pine Labs into the consumer payments category. The Singapore company allows users to make QR-based offline payments through its app and alerts customers to offers, refunds, and store loyalty benefits being run by the store at the time of payment.

In India, Fave will offer payments based on the Unified Payments Interface (UPI) and are awaiting the required approvals from the National Payments Corp. of India (NPCI).

"More and more offline merchants want to create interactions with their existing customers to increase loyalty and store visits. However, the cash-back and loyalty experience is currently disrupted in the offline world. With Fave, consumers can be informed of these benefits within an ecosystem. One, with the help of Pine Labs' deep partnership with these merchants, "said B. Amrish Rau, CEO, Pine Labs, in an interview.

The acquisition will also help the two companies accelerate their growth in Asia and unlock opportunities for consumers in the retail, food and beverage, fashion, and consumer goods businesses.

In December, we first reported that Pine Labs was entering the Southeast Asian markets of Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam, Singapore, and Indonesia through a "buy now, pay later" credit offered through a partnership with the Mastercard investor.

By powering Pine Labs' financial services play, Fave will introduce a Qwikcilver gift card on the new platform in India, along with "Buy now, pay later" solutions. Pine Labs completed the acquisition of Qwikcilver in 2019.

Fave plans to expand the Fave app to 10 million users and 500,000 merchants in the short term. However, the company declined to comment on the timing of this achievement.

"We have succeeded in digitizing and strengthening the loyalty system that offline merchants offer customers (either through membership cards or paper coupons) in the Singapore and Malaysian markets. Fave Co-Founder and CEO Joel Neoh added that Fave plans to implement the same with the consumer app in India, which is expected to launch this quarter.

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