Tez
Developer(s)Google
Initial release17 August 2017 (2017-08-17)
PlatformAndroid, iOS
LicenseProprietary

Tez was a mobile payments service by Google, targeted at users in India,[1] later folded into the new Google Pay app on 28 August 2018.[2] It operated atop the Unified Payments Interface, developed by the National Payments Corporation of India.[3] The product was created as part of Google's Next Billion Users initiative led by Caesar Sengupta, former vice president and general manager, Payments & Next Billion Users, Google.[4]


Tez worked on the vast majority of India's smartphones (with apps for both Android and iOS) with the Android app supporting English, Hindi, Tamil, Bengali, Gujarati, Kannada, Marathi, and Telugu.[1] There were plans to release the app in other emerging countries including Vietnam, Indonesia, and Thailand.[5] "Tez" is the Hindi word for "Fast". Within 37 days after being launched, Tez got about 8.5 million installations. Over 30 million transactions were made on the app as of 27 October 2017.

Service

Acceptability

Tez was accepted by PVR Cinemas, redBus, McDonald's, ACT Broadband, State government Electricity boards and was expected to be joined by a number of other businesses like Dish TV, Jet Airways and Domino's, Vodafone Idea, Swiggy, Zomato, Uber, Ola, Clubfactory, Zappfresh, Amazon, Flipkart and many more businesses. Google was also working with existing advertisers and online e-commerce platforms like Shopify and payment aggregators like BillDesk and PayU. Google planned to add even more ways to pay on Tez (e.g., credit cards and wallets). Select phones from manufacturer partners Lava, Nokia Mobile, and Panasonic would have come with Tez preinstalled.[1]

Device compatibility

The app was compatible with the vast majority of Android and iOS devices.

Technology

The application did not require users to share any personal information such as mobile numbers or usernames like other payment applications. Instead, it used audio QR codes[5] that relied on sound transmitted at a frequency inaudible to the human ear from the payee handset to the merchant handset. This technology does away with the need for NFC chips on the handsets, which gave it an advantage since a significant number of smartphones in India and other developing markets do not have NFC chips embedded. This was indeed a technology ahead of its time.[1]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 "Introducing Tez—a mobile payments and commerce app from Google, made for India first". Google Blog. 18 September 2017. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
  2. ↑ Caesar Sengupta GM (August 28, 2018). "Google Pay — the next step in the Tez journey". Google India Blog.
  3. ↑ "Introducing Tez, a mobile payments and commerce app from Google". Google India. 18 September 2017. Retrieved 18 September 2017.
  4. ↑ "Longtime Google VP in charge of Pay, Next Billion Users and oversaw Chrome OS departs". 9to5 Google. 21 March 2021. Retrieved 29 September 2023.
  5. 1 2 Ong, Thuy (September 18, 2017). "Google's new payment app for India uses sound to transfer money". The Verge.
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