BHIM looks to bulk up with ONDC to take on digital payment heavyweights
BHIM or Bharat Interface for Money will soon become available on the government-backed nonprofit Open Network for Digital Commerce (ONDC), with an aim to counter the dominance of Google Pay and Walmart-backed PhonePe in India’s digital payments sector, people aware told ET.
BHIM, developed by the apex group for digital payment systems in the country — National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI), will foray into the ecommerce arena on ONDC through a separate division, they added.
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NPCI and ONDC did not respond to ET’s request for a comment.
BHIM built on NPCI’s digital payments railroad Unified Payments Interface (UPI) — was launched in 2016 but has seen much lower adoption compared to rivals such as Google Pay and PhonePe, which together command nearly 85% of India’s digital payment market.
Both Google Pay and PhonePe are also built on the UPI platform and designed to facilitate e-payments directly through banks and encourage cashless transactions.
With BHIM due to debut on ONDC, its prospects are expected to
