Amazon is considering turning its payment services in India into a standalone app, according to three sources familiar with the situation, as the company seeks to increase the usage of Amazon Pay in the country.
Currently, Amazon Pay is integrated within Amazon’s main e-commerce app in India and allows users to perform a variety of financial activities, such as transferring money to individuals and merchants, paying bills, purchasing insurance and travel tickets, investing in mutual funds and digital gold, and buying travel tickets.
The tech giant has been exploring the idea of separating its payments service from the e-commerce app for about a year and plans to move forward with the initiative in the coming months, according to two of the sources. It has already approached the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) for approval, according to another source.
The sources requested anonymity due to the confidential nature of the discussions, noting that Amazon may still revise or abandon the plan as it faces various challenges in India. An Amazon spokesperson declined to comment, calling the reports speculative.
Currently, Amazon Pay ranks sixth among apps on the Unified Payments Interface (UPI), the leading digital payments network in India. In July, Amazon Pay processed approximately 72.4 million transactions, which accounted for about 0.5% of all transactions on the network. In comparison, Walmart’s PhonePe handled 6.9 billion transactions, while Google Pay processed 5.3 billion.
Amazon isn’t the only company considering similar moves in India, where superapp strategies inspired by China’s tech industry have struggled to gain traction. Its main competitor in India, Flipkart, recently consolidated its fintech services into a single vertical, two years after spinning off PhonePe.
