Xinhua Insight: Alipay tests water in Taiwan market with newly-activated mobile wallet

The blue poster of Alipay's "Double 12" shopping campaign was hung high at the entrance of Taipei's busiest shopping street Ximenting Saturday, welcoming mainland tourists whose mobile phones carry the company's payment application.

The posters, with the big notice of 50-percent discount, were also seen at glass windows and cash desks of several bakeries, pharmacies and souvenir shops along the street.

This was the online payment giant's first commercial campaign since it activated the mobile payment service two weeks ago in the island. It offers mainland customers a quick and easy payment in Taiwan, with the instant exchange between New Taiwan dollars and Renminbi, though still banned from doing business with Taiwan shoppers.

At a shop of Vigor Kobo in Ximenting, a local bakery chain store, the cashier enthusiastically mentioned the Alipay service to customers and a large number of them took out their mobile phones for her to scan the QR code.

"This is brilliant. The cashier typed in New Taiwan dollars and my account showed the cost of Renminbi, not mentioning the discount," said Li Mingyue, a Beijing girl drawn into the store by the discount poster.

Studying in a Taipei university, Li told Xinhua that sometimes she would miss the convenience of mobile wallet as Taiwan has not offered similar services.

"Once scan, I feel quite at home," she said.

A lady surnamed Wu from southern Chinese city of Shenzhen was seen downloading the Alipay's application in front of the cash desk.

"I use Alipay at home but did not install it on my mobile phone. Who would expect it can be used in Taiwan?" said the lady who preferred not to give her full name.

He Wan-cheng, general manager of Vigor Kobo, told xinhua that mobile payment is quicker than credit cards, which saves customers a lot of time and trouble.

"About 65 percent of our customers are mainland tourists. At busy hours, people have to queue up long for cashing. Using mobile payment, customers do not need to sign, which speeds up the process," He said.

Not only famous chain stores, small vendors at night markets have also signed up for the service. A snack stall selling spring rolls, which has opened for more than six decades in Taipei's Ningxia Night Street, has had its first QR code since Dec. 1.

"I do not need to give changes and the payment goes directly to my bank account. That's convenient," said Lin Chiu-yun, the stall owner. About 70 vendors at the night market have offered the payment method.

According to Ant Financial, Alibaba's financial service affiliate that operates Alipay, about 3,500 Taiwan businesses, including department stores, supermarkets, street vendor associations, chain stores and telecom firms, have signed up for the service since its official launch on Dec. 1.

The increasing number of mainland visitors to Taiwan offer a huge business opportunity for Alipay as well as local small business, said Ray Gu, director of Ant Financial Global Business-Taiwan, at a press conference earlier this week.

Last year, about 3.22 million mainland tourists visited the island, an annual increase of 47 percent. The number reached 3.11 million in the first nine months of this year.

Introducing Alipay to Taiwan can also be a good chance for the island to promote digital payment, said Winni Liu, executive vice president of Digital Business Department of E.SUN Bank, Ant Financial's Taiwan partner.

"Many local business, especially small ones, are conservative about digital payment. Now, in order to attract mainland customers, they began to use Alipay and get used to the service. Later they will be more open to other local payment platforms," she said.

Unlike booming e-commerce and digital payment business in the mainland, many Taiwanese still prefer cash and off-line shopping.

"The digital payment market in Taiwan is of great potential as about 70 percent of transactions here are still through cash," Gu said.

Taiwan authorities issued a regulation on digital payment in May, considered as an official approval for the service. A number of local banks and payment platforms are preparing their own mobile payment services.

Gu remained cautious about expanding business into local transactions, pledging that Alipay will not pose a threat to local digital payment service providers. Endi