Android Pay, Google’s own mobile payment system has finally arrived in Asia today, first debuting in Singapore. The city state is only the third market worldwide where the payment system has debuted – it first made its appearance in the US and then to the UK.
For Android Pay’s debut in Singapore, the payment system will work with MasterCard and Visa cards issued from the DBS Bank, OCBC Bank, POSB, Standard Chartered Bank and UOB. Currently the service will work with any Android KitKat equipped Android phones that have NFC built-in.
Google’s facing an uphill battle for their payment gateway in Singapore and other parts of Asia. They’ve been beaten to the punch by Apple in Singapore, with the Cupertino-based company launching Apple Pay in April. Korean rival Samsung also launched their own system, dubbed Samsung Pay in Singapore recently, on June 16.
On their part Google is looking to expand the roll-out of Google Pay to other countries, though Mr Pali Bhat, senior director of product management at Google declined to give a specific timeline.
