US payments firm ACI wants a piece of action in India
MUMBAI: India could soon emerge as the country with a payments system which the rest of the world could be envious of, said Craig Saks, chief operating officer of ACI Universal Payments, an US-based payments technology firm.
With Aadhaar as the base, instant payments systems and advanced digital wallets India is in a sweet spot to facilitate a shift from cash to digital currency which in turn could boost the country's economy, he said.
ACI which processes around $14 trillion worth of transactions every day globally is actively trying to participate in the Indian digital payments ecosystem by introducing their cloud-based technology solutions in partnership with Indian payments company AGS Transact.
The company is planning to utilise the local outreach of AGS to reach out to Indian merchants and their retailers with cloud-based solutions which would allow them to process payments directly instead of going through an acquiring bank.
"At present, retailers have to access payments network through an acquiring bank but what we can bring through this partnership is the complete gamut of payments across wallets, cards, Aadhaar-enabled payments," said Ravi Goyal, managing director, AGS Transact. Saks said that while India is bringing in a lot of advanced technology in the payments space, it is very fragmented and each are operating in a closed loop.
"Without ubiquity, no payment system can be sustainable and though mostly payments start within a closed loop, they finally move on to open loop. I think some of the work that is being done around open loop wallets in India is commendable," said Saks.
Another important point of participation would be cyber security where ACI is planning to bring its expertise into the Indian market through this partnership.
With Aadhaar as the base, instant payments systems and advanced digital wallets India is in a sweet spot to facilitate a shift from cash to digital currency which in turn could boost the country's economy, he said.
ACI which processes around $14 trillion worth of transactions every day globally is actively trying to participate in the Indian digital payments ecosystem by introducing their cloud-based technology solutions in partnership with Indian payments company AGS Transact.
The company is planning to utilise the local outreach of AGS to reach out to Indian merchants and their retailers with cloud-based solutions which would allow them to process payments directly instead of going through an acquiring bank.
"At present, retailers have to access payments network through an acquiring bank but what we can bring through this partnership is the complete gamut of payments across wallets, cards, Aadhaar-enabled payments," said Ravi Goyal, managing director, AGS Transact. Saks said that while India is bringing in a lot of advanced technology in the payments space, it is very fragmented and each are operating in a closed loop.
"Without ubiquity, no payment system can be sustainable and though mostly payments start within a closed loop, they finally move on to open loop. I think some of the work that is being done around open loop wallets in India is commendable," said Saks.
Another important point of participation would be cyber security where ACI is planning to bring its expertise into the Indian market through this partnership.
