SINGAPORE - Ant International, which is headquartered here, has cast its net wider to reach more users with the addition of six new international e-wallets in Singapore.
Its cross-border mobile payments and marketing platform, Alipay+, recently enabled Hipay from Mongolia; MPay from Macau; MyPB by Public Bank Berhad; Toss Pay and Naver Pay from South Korea; and Tinaba from Italy.
The additions bring the total number of overseas e-wallets that can be used here when making purchases to 12.
E-wallets that were already in use here include AlipayHK from Hong Kong, TrueMoney from Thailand and GCash from the Philippines.
Ant International, which is the international arm of Chinese fintech giant Ant Group, on Feb 5 said Resorts World Sentosa (RWS) is among the first of Alipay+ merchants in Singapore to accept 12 international e-wallets, under an expanded partnership.
This means tourists visiting RWS can use their domestic e-wallets to make payments at the casino operator’s attractions and stores.
E-wallets, though not as common in Singapore, are a popular payment method in the region.
The move comes ahead of Feb 9, when the visa-free policy between Singapore and China takes effect.
Under the policy, citizens of Singapore and China will be able to enter each other’s country without the need for a visa, and stay up to 30 days.
Ant International said the visa-free agreement will facilitate greater ease of entry to Singapore for Chinese tourists.
It noted that data from the Singapore Tourism Board stated that visitor arrivals in the first 11 months of 2023 were already double that of the same period in 2022. Tourists from mainland China, Malaysia, the Philippines and South Korea are among the top 10 in terms of visitor arrivals.
Dr Cherry Huang, general manager of Alipay+ offline merchant services at Ant International, said more travellers can now enjoy seamless mobile payments when they visit Singapore.
“To help businesses in Singapore, big and small, to benefit from the growth in tourism in 2024 and beyond, we’re focused on strengthening our Alipay+ ecosystem locally, by bringing in more users via our payment partners and expanding our merchant coverage through close collaborations with our local partners and our integration with SGQR,” she said.
In Singapore, Alipay+ is accepted in many places, from taxis and food to retail shops and attractions. It also has a network of SGQR merchants, which includes all hawker centres islandwide.
Mr Chang Chee Pey, senior vice-president and chief experience officer at RWS, noted that Chinese visitors are an important source market for the company.
Hence, it is vital to make it more convenient for Chinese visitors to enjoy their time at RWS, particularly as flight frequency increases as visa-free travel begins.
Alipay+ says it now operates across 57 markets and connects more than 88 million global merchants across borders to 1.5 billion accounts on over 25 leading e-wallets and payment apps.
