From Access to Usage: How RuPay Cards Shape Financial Inclusion Outcomes in India

The global payment card network industry was initially dominated by just a few players. Among these global players, Visa® and MasterCard® enjoy a dominant market share. However, recently there has been an increasing trend towards domestic processing of payment transactions in many countries. These countries have launched their own payment gateways like Union Pay TM and RuPay. RuPay was conceived by NPCI, an initiative of the RBI and an umbrella for all retail payment system in India. The present paper is a descriptive study based on the secondary data obtained from NPCI, RBI, UPI which discusses the efforts of NPCI towards effective implementation of Ru Pay, the payment gateway of India. It further analyzes the key concerns arising from the new networks for existing global players and how they will have to alter their existing strategies to operate in this new environment. Further the paper provides with suggestions on the steps needed to be undertaken by these new domestic networks in order to succeed in an industry dominated by a few players.