Amazon Considers Moving Amazon Pay to Standalone App in India

Amazon is considering moving its payments offering in India to a standalone app, three sources familiar with the matter told TechCrunch, as the e-commerce giant looks to expand its use of Amazon Pay in the country.

Amazon Pay is currently part of the company’s main e-commerce app in India and allows users to send money to individuals and merchants, pay bills, buy insurance and travel tickets, invest in mutual funds and digital gold, and buy travel tickets.

The US tech giant has been considering separating its payments service from its e-commerce app for about a year and intends to proceed with that plan in the coming months, two of the sources said.

Some Amazon executives feel that Amazon Pay is not getting the attention it deserves in an e-commerce app, one of the sources said, adding that a separate app with a single focus could help the payments platform gain wider recognition in the country.

The sources, who requested anonymity because the discussions are confidential and ongoing, warned that Amazon, which is grappling with a host of other challenges in India, could change its plans and still abandon the idea.

An Amazon spokesman declined to comment, calling the reports speculation.

Amazon Pay ranks sixth among apps on the Unified Payments Interface, the payments network that is the most popular way for Indians to make online transactions. In July, Amazon Pay processed about 72.4 million transactions, or about 0.5% of all transactions on the network, according to official data. By comparison, Walmart’s PhonePe processed 6.9 billion transactions, while Google Pay handled 5.3 billion.

Amazon isn’t alone in considering similar options in India, where Chinese-style super app strategies haven’t had much success. Its main Indian rival, Flipkart, consolidated its fintech offerings into a single vertical late last month, two years after separating from PhonePe.