Samsung Pay Adds 1 Million Users in India in Over a Month

With changing ecosystem and increasing awareness of digital payments, Samsung Pay, the mobile payments service of South Korean handset maker, has seen an addition of 1 million users in over a month.

Samsung Pay was launched in the country in March this year and India features in the top three countries among the 20 nations for Samsung Pay globally in terms of users, behind South Korea and Russia.

"On September 12 we had announced that we had 1.5 million users of Samsung Pay. Now we have an additional 1 million users in the last one-and-half months. The user growth has been significant," Samsung India Director Commercialization Group (Product Planning) Sanjay Razdan told reporters in Mumbai.

Samsung Pay is available for users of devices like Galaxy Note 8, Galaxy S8, Galaxy S8+, Galaxy S7 Edge, Galaxy J7 Max, and Galaxy J7 Pro, among others, and allows users to just tap and pay using the debit/ credit cards and wallets stored on their mobile devices.

During the launch Samsung Pay was available through 10 models and has expanded it to 26 models since then. According to industry estimates the overall mobile phone market in India is pegged at Rs. 1 lakh crores for 2017, with Samsung commanding a market share of 47 percent at the end of September 30.

Samsung witnessed a growth of 40 percent in terms of value during the festive season this year for its handset sales.

It has 17 partners on board, including 10 banks and is in talks with a couple of more banks for pay service.

Razdan, who heads the Samsung Pay business in India, said some of the other countries are trying to implement some of India's model like bank to bank transfer.