‘We didn’t try to be God’: Why Ant ditched its S-E Asia dream to help rivals cross borders

ANT Group’s vision when it first eyed South-east Asia took quite a different form. Giddy from the success in its homeground of China, the Alibaba affiliate was ready to take its fintech super app strategy to the next most-promising market and build a unified e-wallet for the region.

Reality hit quickly. Ant set foot in Singapore in 2013 and began persuading merchants to accept its e-wallet Alipay, but none were convinced.

QR code payment technology was alien to them. “Merchants had a lot of concerns — ‘Is the QR code really safe? If I scan it, will my phone get some kind of virus?’” Jia Hang, Ant’s regional general manager for South-east Asia, told The Business Times in an interview.