xi's moments
Home | Society

WeChat pushes forward: Palm swiping next

By Qiu Quanlin in Guangzhou | chinadaily.com.cn | Updated: 2023-03-30 10:45

Zhang Ying, vice-president of Tencent Holdings, describes the latest developments of WeChat Pay on Tuesday at a meeting in Guangzhou, Guangdong province. [Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

Cross-border payments from the WeChat Pay digital wallet platform now covers 69 countries and regions, with more than 1,000 overseas cooperating institutions, according to a senior manager at the company.

More than 4 million overseas merchants have connected to the platform, said Zhang Ying, vice-president of Tencent Holdings and the manager in charge of WeChat Pay.

"Following the adjustment of the COVID-19 policy, our business both in domestic and overseas markets is expected to increase significantly," Zhang said during a WeChat open meeting on Tuesday in Guangzhou, Guangdong province.

During the meeting, other managers from WeChat — an online business unit of Tencent — also shared the company's latest developments.

WeChat Pay continues to assist digital operations in various ways in the domestic market, Zhang said.

After the platform launched a post-payment coupon function in its mini program, some 25,000 businesses accessed the function, helping drive a total of 12 billion yuan ($1.74 billion) in consumption over the past three years, he said.

Based on the post-payment function, a merchant's account in WeChat's mini program will push a coupon to reach the customers again online after they consume offline.

"We have also supported the issuance of digital consumption vouchers by governments," he said, adding that a total of 260 projects at the provincial and city levels since 2020 have involved government vouchers valued at 21 billion yuan.

WeChat Pay also plans to launch a palm-swiping function, using innovative technologies to make life more convenient.

"Users can link their membership cards, transportation cards and other electronic codes to their palms to verify their memberships, facilitate consumption and pass through entry points," Zhang said.

Some businesses have been invited to help create the applications.

"I used to think swiping palms was very technologically cool," he said. "Now I think that whatever the technology, so long as it's convenient enough, it will succeed."

Global Edition
BACK TO THE TOP
Copyright 1995 - . All rights reserved. The content (including but not limited to text, photo, multimedia information, etc) published in this site belongs to China Daily Information Co (CDIC). Without written authorization from CDIC, such content shall not be republished or used in any form. Note: Browsers with 1024*768 or higher resolution are suggested for this site.
License for publishing multimedia online 0108263

Registration Number: 130349