WeChat Will Roll Out UPI Payment App In India Around May, Internal Sources Reveal

Reports say that Tencent-owned messaging app WeChat is planning to roll out its payment system in India. Right now, the company is working to obtain payments license from NPCI, short for National Payment Corporation of India. It also has built partnerships with three banks in India, according to Entrackr’s report on Wednesday.

As revealed by NPCI’s internal sources, officials of Tencent and NPCI had a meeting three weeks ago to obtain a license to launch UPI (Unified Payment Interface)-based payment app in the country. WeChat will probably launch a separate app for this service, named the WeChat Pay. The three banks that it has partnered with include ICICI, HDFC, and Axis Bank.

The two internal sources providing the information said:

The reported also suggested that the company is likely to launch its UPI-powered payment app by the end of May or June. Tencent is believed to be registering an Indian entity for its WeChat Pay app.

WeChat Pay is currently the most popular app for payments in China, just after the Alipay. Early last year, the number of active user on WeChat Pay crossed Aplipay’s 520 million too.

Just last week, Chinese phone maker Xiaomi officially rolled out its Mi Pay to the Indian market. The company built its app based on UPI and provides support for over 120 banks. Mi Pay is also deeply integrated with Xiaomi’s MIUI that it mostly used on its Android smartphones. With Mi Pay, Xiaomi smartphone users can make payments through contacts, messages, as well as other apps thanks to the deep integration.