China's Xiaomi cooperated with China UnionPay in launching its payment service MI Pay.
With this move, Xiaomi becomes yet another smartphone maker that chas ooperated with China UnionPay in launching mobile payment services, following Apple and Samsung. Prior to this, China's Huawei also launched its payment service, but Huawei's partner is Bank of China.
Commenting on the cooperation, Xiaomi's representative said that MI Pay will first support credit and debit cards from over ten banks. Its service began last week on September 1.
In April 2016, Xiaomi announced a partnership with China UnionPay, which was a sign that the company might launch payment services. However, the company did not reveal further detail at that time. On August 12, Xiaomi launched beta testing and invited users to test its payment product.
The launch of MI Pay also marks Xiaomi's major progress in the financial sector. The company's deployment in the financial sector can trace back to December 2013 when it set up a payment subsidiary with a CNY50 million capitalization.