Alipay and Worldline to enable mobile payment in Europe for tourists from all over Asia

As part of the enhanced partnership, Worldline will bring more Asian e-wallet users to Europe by allowing merchants’ point-of-sale (POS) systems to accept not only payments from Alipay’s proprietary wallet, but also from Alipay’s e-wallet partners across Asia. This multi-wallet acceptance will mean that merchants across Europe will see increased footfall and spend from tourists from all over Asia.

Alipay currently serves over 1.2 billion users together with local e-wallet partners in the Republic of Korea, Thailand, Malaysia, the Philippines, Indonesia, India, Bangladesh, and Pakistan.

“During China’s ‘Golden Week’ national holiday in October, we found that European countries continue to be among the top travel destinations for Chinese tourists.” says Karl Wehner, General Manager Germany, Switzerland, Austria Alibaba Group of which Alipay is a part of its ecosystem. “For us, this is a clear sign of the enormous potential for European merchants to connect to even more Asian tourists, and we aim to serve them with our innovative technology through our extended cooperation with our trusted partner Worldline.”

The UK, Germany, France and Italy led in popularity among Chinese tourists during the week-long holiday, while substantial growth was recorded in overall transaction volume and average spend per capita in countries such as Luxembourg, Austria, Switzerland and the Nordics, according to Alipay’s analysis.

Roger Niederer, Chief Market Officer Merchant Services at Worldline: “Our vision is to create maximum simplicity for both merchants and their customers in order to provide a smooth payment journey. By expanding our partnership with Alipay, we unlock the potential of a new generation of Asian tourists for our merchants across Europe and service the global economy in a most efficient way.”

Alipay and Worldline look back to a proven partnership. Since the start of their cooperation in 2016, merchants from more than 20 European countries were connected to Alipay’s payment service, thus giving participants access to the growing number of Asian tourists travelling to Europe each year.

By using the fully integrated POS solution from Worldline, retail stores, hotels, restaurants and transport companies across Europe are able to accept payments made using the Alipay mobile app without any extra effort for their staff or the customer at the check-out. Transactions are fast, secure and the familiar customer journey is convenient for Asian tourists who visit Europe to shop and see the sights.

This simple acceptance solution is now expanded to Alipay’s e-wallet partners. These will be made available to merchant customers of Worldline in the near future.

About Worldline

Worldline [Euronext: WLN] is the European leader in the payment and transactional services industry. With innovation at the core of its DNA, Worldline’s core offerings include pan-European and domestic Commercial Acquiring for physical or online businesses, secured payment transaction processing for banks and financial institutions, as well as transactional services in e-Ticketing and for local and central public agencies. Thanks to a presence in 30+ countries, Worldline is the payment partner of choice for merchants, banks, public transport operators, government agencies and industrial companies, delivering cutting-edge digital services. Worldline’s activities are organized around three axes: Merchant Services, Financial Services including equensWorldline and Mobility & e-Transactional Services. Worldline employs circa 11,000 people worldwide, with 2018 pro forma revenue of circa 2.2 billion euros. worldline.com

About Alipay

Operated by Ant Financial Services Group, Alipay is the world’s leading payment and lifestyle platform. Launched in 2004, Alipay serves over 1.2 billion users with its local e-wallets partners as of June 2019. Over the years, Alipay has evolved from a digital wallet to a lifestyle enabler. Users can hail a taxi, book a hotel, buy movie tickets, pay utility bills, make appointments with doctors, or purchase wealth management products directly from within the app. In addition to online payments, Alipay is expanding to in-store offline payments both inside and outside of China. Alipay’s in-store payment service covers over 50 markets across the world, and tax reimbursement via Alipay is supported in 35 markets. Alipay works with over 250 overseas financial institutions and payment solution providers to enable cross-border payments for Chinese travelling overseas and overseas customers who purchase products from Chinese e-commerce sites. Alipay currently supports 27 currencies.

Media contacts:

Alipay                                                      

Franz Peter Handermann
FleishmanHillard Germany
Tel: +49-69-405702-525
Email: franz.handermann@fleishman.com

Xinyun Yang
International Communications
Ant Financial Services Group
Tel: +86 1381 6896 301
Email: xinyun.yang@antfin.com

Worldline

Susanne Stöger  
Head Global External Communications          
Tel: +43 1 71701 6524                                                         
Email: susanne.stoeger@worldline.com