As it stands, Apple Pay is only available in the US, although with a little tweaking and an American-based credit card, Apple Pay can be used overseas if the compatible payment terminals are available. We can only imagine that Apple will want to roll out Apple Pay to more markets in the future, but which?
Well speaking to the Xinhua news agency (via Reuters), it seems that Apple is currently eyeing the Chinese market. According to Apple’s CEO Tim Cook, he was quoted as saying, “China is a really key market for us. Everything we do, we are going to work it here. Apple Pay is on the top of the list.”
This is hardly a surprise as it was revealed in a survey that the Chinese market was open to the idea of mobile payments, versus Europe where contactless payments have been around for a while, so the idea of Apple Pay might not be as novel. It was also revealed that Apple had a sit down with Chinese vice premier, Ma Kai who is a member of the CPC Central Committee Political Bureau, where topics such as privacy and security were discussed.
It was revealed that the talks were considered to be “very open”, although the specifics were not revealed. China is an important market for Apple given their rising spending power and population. The Cupertino company’s new iPhones proved to be a hit and we had heard that Apple plans on launching more Apple stores in the country.
Filed in . Read more about Apple Pay.