Liquid Group, Singaporean based payments company, announced today that it has expanded its cross-border QR payment acceptance partnerships to include acquirers across 10 markets in Asia including Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Thailand, Cambodia, Philippines, Hong Kong, China, Taiwan and South Korea. They claim to have a combined merchant base of 6 million across the region.
This story follows their recent announcement of partnering up with Changi Airport to roll out unified point-of-sale (POS) for QR payments.
Interoperability trials with 6 markets will commence in Q4 2019, followed by the remaining markets next year. They expect it to take 24 to 36 months for the partner acquirers to enable the majority of their merchant base for cross border QR acceptance.
Jeremy Tan, Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Liquid Group, said,
“We are encouraged by the strong support of our partner acquirers who share a common objective to achieve borderless interoperability of QR payments. By establishing a partnership across 10 markets together, we will become the first in the world to truly advance open cross-border QR payments and spearhead the creation of a more connected and robust mobile payment ecosystem for all.”
QR payments are becoming increasingly popular in ASEAN with countries like Singapore, Indonesia, Philippines, and Malaysia each adopting standardised QR codes to drive interoperability.
While the widespread adoption of QR codes for payments might be seen as a boon for mobile payments, some quarters including the creator of QR codes have voiced concerns about its security.
Featured image credit: LiquidPay