WhatsApp to offer Digital Payments in India
Facebook owned WhatsApp seems to be planning to enter into the mobile payments segment in India. The popular messaging app is reportedly planning to introduce a peer-to-peer payment system in the country, which is likely to be based on Unified Payments Interface (UPI) platform. If launched, it will be first such offering globally from the social networking giant.
According to a report in The Ken website, citing unnamed sources, WhatsApp is working to launch person-to-person payment system in India in the next six months.
A job advertisement on the company’s website said that it is looking for a candidate with a technical and financial background – who understands India’s UPI and the BHIM payments app that enable money transfers and merchant payments using mobile numbers — to be its digital transactions lead for the country.
Earlier this year (in February to be precise), the company’s co-founder Brian Acton, while talking to media, had said that the company may enter digital payments segment.
“India is an important country for WhatsApp, and we’re understanding how we can contribute more to the vision of Digital India,” a WhatsApp spokesman said, referring to a flagship government program that aims to boost the use of Internet-based services in the country.
“We’re exploring how we might work with companies that share this vision and continuing to listen closely to feedback from our users,” the spokesman said, declining to elaborate further.
Digital transactions in India have surged after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ban on Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes in November 2017.
A WhatsApp move into digital payments in India, its biggest market that is home to 200 million of its billion-plus global users, would replicate similar moves by messaging apps like Tencent Holdings Ltd’s WeChat in China. Recently, South Korean tech giant Samsung also launched its mobile payment platform Samsung Pay in India. It is a mobile payment platform similar to Apple Pay. Samsung smartphone users can use it to pay for goods and services, the way they use their credit cards and other payment apps.
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