Pine Labs appoints ex-Amazon India HR Head Vijayalakshmi Swaminathan as Chief People Officer

Payments platform Pine Labs has roped in former Amazon India HR head Vijayalakshmi Swaminathan as its new Chief People Officer.

Prior to Amazon India, Swaminathan was one of the founding Partners at CoCoon Consulting, a cross-sectoral boutique HR consulting firm with expertise in solutions for organisational & leadership transformation & growth. CoCoon, over the last 20 years, has worked with organisations across Asia, Europe, and Latin America. She has also worked with FMCG major Unilever where, in her last role, she was responsible for bolstering the company’s employer brand, Pine Labs said in an statement.

“A high-performance workforce will accelerate the progress we have made in recent years. I will also mince no words to say that we want to be seen as the ‘Employer of Choice’ for talented individuals out there who want to join Pine Labs, a company that gives an opportunity to innovate and excel. It is here that I am so thrilled to welcome Viji Swaminathan as our next HR head. I am sure her immense experience will add that spark into our HR function and help us attain newer heights in the future. I welcome her and wish her the very best,” said B Amrish Rau, CEO, Pine Labs.

Swaminathan, meanwhile, stated that the Pine Labs story is an incredible one of a truly transformative and future-focused company that responsibly drives sustainable growth. “I thank Amrish for the opportunity and look forward to building on the strong foundation laid by this team to create a world-class, employee-first organization,” she added.

Swaminathan has a post-graduate degree in personnel management & industrial relations from XLRI, Jamshedpur.

She takes over from Anu Mathew who will now transition into the role of the Head of Learning & Development at Pine Labs.

Pine Labs serves prominent large, mid-sized and small merchants across India and Southeast Asia. The firm’s cloud-based software platform enables it to offer a wide range of payment acceptance and merchant commerce solutions including enterprise automation systems such as inventory management and customer relationship management. Its stored value platform includes issuing, processing, and distributing digital gift cards for corporate customers around the world.

In April 2021, Pine Labs acquired Fave, a customer fintech platform that provides a smart payment app to the smart generation of consumers looking to pay and save. Fave is currently available in Singapore, Malaysia and Indonesia and will be rolled out in India in the near term. Incorporated in Singapore, Pine Labs' key investors include Sequoia India, Actis Capital, Temasek, PayPal and Mastercard.