First KFC, and now McDonald’s.
Ant Financial’s Alipay mobile payments service is quickly gaining acceptance from major fast food companies in China. The latest partnership between Alibaba’s financial arm and the fast food giant will allow for Alipay mobile payments to be made at 2,100 locations.
The initial rollout will begin in Shanghai and the rest of China should see mobile payment acceptance rolled out in the next six months.
“It will take customers only two seconds to pay [for] their meals at McDonald’s after introducing Alipay to its outlets, by scanning the QR code in users’ Alipay,” Ant Financial said in a statement.
Beyond the fast food industry, Alipay is also reportedly going to work with McDonald’s on “data technologies,” in order to gain a better understanding about its customers, businesses and ecosystems. That data will then be used to gather information about Chinese consumers in order to grow its business model.
In other big news for Alibaba, just this week it secured a deal with Paytm, India’s largest eCommerce/mobile payments company. The deal is reported to be worth $680 million. This would also value Paytm at $4 billion. Ant Financial’s stake, on the other hand, will decline from 25 percent to 20 percent.
Vijay Shekhar Sharma, founder and CEO of Paytm, said the company is looking “to bring half a billion Indians to the mainstream economy and help millions of small businesses leverage this large mCommerce opportunity.” India of late has been an increasingly large and attractive target for U.S. tech investors, particularly as economic conditions in China have made it a less conducive environment for growth. Alibaba apparently sees a similar opportunity.
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