The media reported that over the past few weeks, Apple has been actively discussing with representatives of the Indian authorities about the start of official negotiations on the launch of the Apple Pay payment service in the South Asian market.
The journalists published this information concerning two people who are aware of the details of the communication of the technology giant with officials from India. Currently, Walmart PhonePe, GPay, and Paytm occupy dominant positions in the fintech space of South Asia.
Apple is working on a special version of its payment system for the Indian financial market. The company’s executive director Tim Cook visited India in April. During this visit, he held a meeting with local bankers. There is no exact information about exactly what issues were discussed by the head of the company with representatives of the banking sector, but with the high probability the prospects for the launch of Apple Pay have become one of the topics that were paid attention to because it is as logical as possible.
Informed sources cited by the media say that the technology giant’s payment application in the version for the Indian market will work on top of UPI, a popular system of similar financial services that are actively operating in the South Asian market. This Asian platform is overseen by a special unit of the central bank of India.
Apple, in the context of entering the Indian financial market, aims to achieve a result in the form of enabling local iPhone owners to QR codes and initiate UPI transactions without having to use any PSP application. This information was provided by sources of media on condition of anonymity.
The tech giant has not yet made any comments on the news about its intentions to launch Apple Pay in India.
In April, the company opened its first Indian retail stores. It was with this event that Tim Cook’s visit to the country was primarily connected. Reports of negotiations over the launch of Apple Pay in the Indian financial market are not sensational news. More than six years ago, the company’s management officially announced its intention to introduce a payment system in India. Since then, repeated attempts have been made to negotiate on the relevant topic with the Indian authorities, but so far these efforts have not brought the desired result. Another attempt to reach an agreement on this issue may also entail nothing.
Informed sources report that during the current negotiations, the tech giant said that Apple Pay may be able to use Face ID to authenticate UPI on the iPhone. Insiders also claim that if the launch of the payment system is agreed with the Indian authorities, the company has yet to decide on partners for the implementation of this project. Informants say that Apple Pay, in case of successful negotiations, will be introduced in India in a few quarters.
Currently, UPI processes more than 8 billion transactions every month. Also, more than 90% of all Indian smartphone owners use the Android operating system. These circumstances mean that the potential launch of Apple Pay in India will not be the beginning of the process of transformation and deep modernization for the country’s financial ecosystem.
As we have reported earlier, Apple Pay Set to Launch in South Korea.
