UnionPay International, a global subsidiary of China's only domestic bank card organisation UnionPay, has signed a standard licensing cooperation agreement with seven member institutions of Asian Payment Network (APN).
As per the terms of the agreement, the major switch networks in Singapore, Thailand, South Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia and the Philippines will adopt UnionPay chip card standard, while accepting and issuing APN brand cards.
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The six participating institutions include National Interbank Transaction Management Exchange (NITMX) in Thailand, the Network for Electronic Transfers Singapore (NETS), ATM switch institution Rintis in Indonesia, the Philippine-based interbank network BancNet, Malaysia Electronic Payment System (MEPS), and Korea Financial Telecommunications and Clearings Institute (KFTC).
The company said that the remaining members of APN too are expected to sign authorization agreement with UnionPay in the near future.
UnionPay will offer technology and business standard, as well as provide training and other services, to promote the use and acceptance of its chip cards in Asia-Pacific region.
The new agreement has helped UnionPay acceptance network to expand into 160 countries and regions. So far, 40 nations and regions have issued UnionPay cards.
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By GlobalDataAPN includes 13 switch networks in 11 Asia-Pacific countries, and it aims to promote the interconnection among various payment networks in the region.
After evaluating the standards of several international bankcard brands through competitive bidding, the APN selected UnionPay as the sole provider of its cross-border chip card standard in 2005.
