India’s leading mobile wallet service has announced that it will soon be accepted at Domino’s Pizza and Cafe Coffee Day among other quick service restaurants (QSRs) as the Alibaba-backed company expands its payment reach. Today, Paytm offers recharge services for mobile phones as well as mobile wallet services for online transactions but now the wallet will have expanded functionality and make Paytm a more everyday type solution.
According to the company, full integration at QSRs won’t occur until mid-June but already the company is expecting that the new feature will help more than double its revenue to $4 billion (Rs. 25,417 crores) by year-end from $1.5 billion currently. Commenting on the announcement, Paytm Vice-President (Business) Amit Lakhotia said,
“We are now foraying into the offline space. We have partnered various QSRs covering 7,000-10,000 outlets in cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Bangalore and Hyderabad. Mobile wallet usage is definitely growing in the country. On our platform alone, about 66 million people are using the wallet services and the number will cross 100 million much before the year ends.”
In February, Chinese e-commerce giant Alibaba acquired a 25% in the company and with great success with its own Alipay mobile payment solution, the company hopes to build similar gains in India. While the infrastructure and mobile payment use varies considerably between India and China, the subcontinent represents a massive market with largely untapped opportunity thus offering big rewards for companies like Paytm and Alibaba.
Overview by Tristan Hugo-Webb, Associate Director, Global Payments Advisory Service at Mercator Advisory group
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