This alliance is designed to improve the digital payments system in Pakistan, tackling general issues such as limited interoperability and elevated transaction costs. Moreover, this initiative is in line with the State Bank of Pakistan's vision for the nation's economic advancement and digital evolution, setting a new point of reference in the region's financial sector.
Alipay+ is a suite of cross-border digital payment, marketing and digitalisation solutions that help connect global merchants to consumers. It also provides users with a broad choice of deals using their preferred payment methods while travelling abroad. Moreover, small and medium-sized businesses may use Alipay+ digital tools to achieve omni-channel growth.
The collaboration between NayaPay and Alipay+ is set to deploy QR codes compatible with both RAAST and Alipay+ payment partners, including e-wallets and bank apps. In addition, it aims to upgrade incoming foreign exchange flows and integrate the cashless payment systems of global markets and Pakistan.
Moreover, according to the official announcement, NayaPay has the necessary capabilities to provide Pakistani businesses of all sizes, particularly SMEs, with a frictionless connection to more than 25 Alipay+ global payment partners. The company reaches more than 1.5 billion consumer accounts, in addition to RAAST. Moreover, this partnership ensures that transactions are not only efficient but also secure, marking an important step forward in the digitisation of commerce in Pakistan.
NayaPay is the first institution of its kind to receive an e-money license from the central bank in Pakistan after a year-long pilot and inspection by the State Bank. Backed by sponsors of the Lakson Group, a conglomerate in Pakistan, NayaPay currently offers consumers a digital wallet with Visa debit cards for everyday payments. Moreover, the fintech aims to simplify financial services and make them accessible to millions of Pakistani users across the country, and it also aims to boost digitisation, especially for the unbanked population.
According to statistics, in 2022 over 50 million Pakistanis were unbanked. Moreover, almost USD 4 trillion worth of payments were made each year in the country, out of which only 1% were digital. Given that most of the Pakistani SMEs were unregistered and had primarily handled transactions in cash, digitisation has the potential to provide a real benefit. In this context, the country became a significant market opportunity for NayaPay and similar platforms.
NayaPay’s projects are designed to address the needs of underbanked citizens, enabling them to create a wallet account within a few minutes on their smartphones and issue a Visa virtual card right on their phone for online purchases on popular international websites, such as Amazon, AliExpress, Facebook and Netflix.
In a need to expand its services, in February 2022, NayaPay received USD 13 million in a seed round led by Zayn Capital to boost Pakistan's digital payments.
Every day we send out a free e-mail with the most important headlines of the last 24 hours.
Subscribe now