Razer unveils proposal for Singapore epayments solution

Photo credit: Tech in Asia.

That didn’t take long.

Razer today published its proposal for a cashless payments system for Singapore – true to its CEO Min-Liang Tan’s word to Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong.

The proposal for how Razer plans to help is two-fold:

• Feedback and advisory services on the Common Epayment Framework (CEF), an initiative by the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) for an open, interoperable payments system that can accommodate several existing payment methods.
• The development and support of an epayment solution “by Singaporeans, for Singaporeans.” This will either be an existing solution, such as Alipay, or a bespoke product built by Razer, called Razerpay.

Razerpay will be aimed at “end-users, consumers, and businesses in Singapore to establish an epayment, cashless service to accept digital transactions over cash instruments.” Razer plans to pour US$7.4 million as seed funding in the project, and staff it with Singaporean experts who will develop and drive it. The proposal website includes open job positions for engineers, business leads, payment services experts, and legal eagles.

The company says it doesn’t expect its product should be the be-all and end-all of epayments in Singapore – if another solution shows up that is massively adopted by Singaporeans and is compliant with the CEF, the company will stop focusing on Razerpay and instead divert its resources to supporting that solution through an advisory board of experts.

It expects to sign up at least 1 million ewallets from October 2017 to May 2019.

The US-headquartered company, which is most famous for its high-end gaming peripherals, computers, wearable devices, and lately the acquisition of George Lucas-founded audio company THX, says it will fund and operate Razerpay under the open framework required and managed by MAS, and not deploy it as a closed, proprietary product for its own profit.

“By providing an open framework and requiring interoperability with other digital payment solutions, this would create an open and shared bridge between all funding sources and merchant acquisitions in Singapore,” the proposal says.

The proposal doesn’t limit its scope to just Singapore either, envisioning the product as a way for Singaporean users to pay their way in other markets across Southeast Asia with it – similar to how Alipay users from China can use their ewallets abroad. “Such implementation should be planned for in advance,” it notes.