The platform is similar to online payment service PayPal of the United States, as users pre-register their credit or debit cards and make transactions simply by logging into their Naver IDs. (image: KobizMedia/ Korea Bizwire)
SEOUL, June 29 (Korea Bizwire) – South Korea’s top Internet portal operator Naver Corp. said Wednesday that the user count of its mobile payment tool, Naver Pay, has topped 11 million a year after its launch, as more smartphone users opt to use it to make e-commerce purchases.
A total of 11 million active users have paid for items through the one-click payment system since it was officially launched on June 25, 2015, the company said. South Korea has a total population of 51 million.
The platform is similar to online payment service PayPal of the United States, as users pre-register their credit or debit cards and make transactions simply by logging into their Naver IDs.
Naver Pay is different from existing mobile payment tools offered by other financial and IT firms here that usually require multiple procedures for ID verification, the company said.
Money transfers through Naver Pay came to almost 2.5 trillion won (US$2.3 billion) during the cited period, with the corresponding figure for June expected to exceed 300 billion won.
Naver also said a total of 92,000 online stores have joined as members, nearly two-fold of some 50,000 when the service was introduced.
Daum Kakao Corp., the operator of the most popular messaging app KakaoTalk and Naver’s archrival, also released a similar mobile payment tool of its own, Kakao Pay.
Kakao, which has been rolling out various services on the back of 38 million local users of the KakaoTalk mobile messenger, said it currently has more than 10 million users for Kakao Pay.’
(Yonhap)
