Mobile Payment in Asia - Pt.1
Will Cash Finally Be Dethroned?
(White paper download at the end of the article)
2019/03/15
The use of mobile phones has been rising in Asia, and with it the technology for making mobile payments. But will this new technology dethrone the traditional payment method of cash?
Mobile penetration may not be as high in Asia as it is in other parts of the world, but it is on the rise and it’s expected to continue to grow. Alongside this, mobile payment transactions in the region are forecast to reach $30 billion by 2021.
So which countries are leading the way? According to our survey, mobile payment is most regularly used in the Chinese and Indian markets (96.0% and 84.3% or users respectively). In contrast, Indonesia has the lowest proportion of regular users (only 40.5%), but this has interesting implications for companies wishing to introduce new mobile payment technologies into the country.
As for the users themselves, our survey found a trend towards younger people using mobile payment in markets with higher mobile penetration and revealed a fairly even gender split across all the countries surveyed.
Overall, the APAC region is made up of a number of different national markets, each at different stages of maturity when it comes to mobile payment. Understanding these markets and the unique make-up of their users is key to understanding the future of mobile payment in Asia.