Google is piloting its own ‘soundbox’ in India for merchants to get audio-based payment alerts

Google is piloting its own ‘soundbox’ in India for merchants to get audio-based payment alerts

a year ago
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https://techcrunch.com/2023/01/17/google-pay-soundbox-india/

Soundboxes — hardware used by merchants that emits sounds every time a mobile payment is made — have taken off in India, where point of sale activity can get busy and voice alerts from the soundbox help alert multitasking shopkeepers and assistants to a transaction going through. Now, to keep pushing ahead to build out its own payments business in the world’s second-largest internet market, Google is getting in on the act.

The internet giant, which is currently one of the mobile transaction leaders in India with Google Pay, is piloting a soundbox of its own in the country to alert sellers of confirmations for UPI payments — a mobile payment standard developed and now ubiquitous in India for instant payments and transfers between banks, or two mobile users, or a customer and a merchant. With UPI payments, providers typically do not take any cut on UPI transactions, so soundboxes have emerged not just as a convenience for merchants, but as a monetizing tool for payments providers, too.

Google is piloting its own ‘soundbox’ in India for merchants to get audio-based payment alerts

Jan 17, 2023, 12:43pm UTC
https://techcrunch.com/2023/01/17/google-pay-soundbox-india/ > Soundboxes — hardware used by merchants that emits sounds every time a mobile payment is made — have taken off in India, where point of sale activity can get busy and voice alerts from the soundbox help alert multitasking shopkeepers and assistants to a transaction going through. Now, to keep pushing ahead to build out its own payments business in the world’s second-largest internet market, Google is getting in on the act. > The internet giant, which is currently one of the mobile transaction leaders in India with Google Pay, is piloting a soundbox of its own in the country to alert sellers of confirmations for UPI payments — a mobile payment standard developed and now ubiquitous in India for instant payments and transfers between banks, or two mobile users, or a customer and a merchant. With UPI payments, providers typically do not take any cut on UPI transactions, so soundboxes have emerged not just as a convenience for merchants, but as a monetizing tool for payments providers, too.