Hike beats Whatsapp to integrating wallet payments to push Digital India initiative
Indian instant messaging platform Hike rolled out an in-app electronic payments wallet to power digital transactions, replicating similar services offered by its backer Tencent Holdings in China, becoming the first messaging platform in the country to have an integrated wallet.
Hike beats Whatsapp to UPI, integrates wallet payments to push Digital India initiative
The Drum earlier reported about how Digital Payments, AI and VR will power the Indian economy in future and Hike is the latest addition to the cashless world. Hike, with it latest initiative, has beaten Whatsapp to unified payments interface (UPI).
Hike Messenger founder and CEO Kavin Bharti Mittal said that the new update (Hike 5.0) will allow free and instant bank-to-bank transfer via UPI, as well as recharge right from the app.
He further added that the rollout to Android and iOS (Apple) users will be completed by June 25, while the wallet feature will be made available to Apple phone users by end of July.
According to Google-Boston Consulting Group (BCG) study, Indian digital payments industry will grow to $500 billion by 2020, contributing to 15% of GDP. Hike's latest venture will also foster India's digital minister Ravi Shankar Prasad's claim of the Indian government estimating the digital economy to surpass $1.115tn by 2024-25.
Mittal also said Hike had been working on the new update for over six months. He said: "With Hike 5.0, we have reduced the app size to just 25MB despite adding all these features and have also added 128-bit SSL encryption to ensure that communication across the air and wire networks, is completely encrypted."