Kakao Pay’s tie-up with Alipay spurs growth in China

BEIJING – Kakao Pay Corp., the mobile payment service unit of South Korean tech giant Kakao Corp., is rapidly growing in China’s fintech sector as it started its digital payment services synchronized with Alipay, Alibaba Group’s digital wallet subsidiary, in March of this year.

The Korean fintech firm saw its number of users and transaction volume in China respectively soar 108 times and 1,263 times in the first five months since March, said Chief Executive Shin Won-keun at a press conference in Beijing on Monday.

Kakao Pay began offering online payment services to merchants that use Alipay Plus throughout China, following a partnership with Alipay in 2018. Alipay Plus, a cross-border electronic wallet service provider, partners with millions of global merchants.

Based on the partnership, Korean visitors to China can make transactions at most of the stores that use Alipay Plus, without a need to install an additional app.

Chinese visitors to Korea also can make online payments by using Alipay, based on synchronization with Kakao Pay.

Kakao Pay will expand the service to 80% of in-store payments across China by the end of this year, Shin said.

The Korean fintech firm aims to expand the service globally, by collaborating with Alipay’s overseas alliance members like the Philippines’ GCash, Malaysia-based Touch ‘n Go, Thailand’s TrueMoney, Italy’s Tinaba and Japan’s PayPay.

Write to Ji-Hoon Lee at lizi@hankyung.com

Jihyun Kim edited this article.