RIL to partner with US tech giants to offer global payment service: Report

Reliance Jio Payments Bank in collaboration with Google, Facebook and others wants to offer payments solution like Visa and Mastercard in global markets.

Last year, Reserve Bank of India (RBI) invited technology companies to create a New Umbrella Entity (NUE) to offer alternative payment solutions in the country.

Currently, UPI (Unified Payment Interface) developed by the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) powers all the cash-less transactions in the Indian market.

All prominent players such as Google, PhonePe, Paytm use UPI in their digital wallets. However, RBI believes the new NUE will encourage companies to develop a better and simpler user interface and also most importantly enhance security. The user interface has to be integrated with ATMs, white-label PoS, Aadhaar-based payments, and remittance, among others for seamless service across multiple money transaction platforms. The primary goal is to attract more users to the ecosystem.

The NUE will be a consortium of companies with shared interests. For instance, Reliance Jio Payments Bank (owned by Reliance Industries Ltd) is joining hands with US tech giants Google, Facebook, Infibeam-owned firm So Hum Bharat, and three other partners.

Now, it has come to light that the NUE formed by the aforementioned firms have not just wanted to offer payment solutions in India, but also envision global roll-out, reported The Economic Times, citing RIL insiders.

This would be mean Jio Payments Bank and the team will be up against Visa and Mastercard in international markets. The former has plans to hire a senior executive with expert knowledge and experience to lead their new project.

With support from Google and Facebook, Reliance Jio Payments Bank can foray into global regions with fewer impediments.

Besides Jio Payments Bank and team, there are at least six consortia of companies in the fray to form the NUE.

Paytm, Ola Financial, IndusInd Bank, and others have formed one. Tata Group, and Yes Bank, are also eyeing to form an NUE group.

There are reports of Amazon in talks with ICICI, Axis Bank, Visa, Bill Desk, and Pine Labs to form an NUE.

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