Samsung's payment service Samsung Pay and Alibaba's payment service Alipay announced an interoperability deal that allows users to complete payments with Alipay accounts on the Samsung Pay app.

Wang Tong, product strategy and development president for Samsung Greater China, said that the cooperation with Alipay opens a new usage scenario for Samsung Pay. At the same time, it provides a more convenient option to users who are used to making payments with Alipay.

Samsung Pay was officially launched in mainland China on March 29, 2016. It supports Galaxy S7, S7 Edge, S6 Edge+, Note 5, Galaxy A5(2016), Galaxy A7(2016), Galaxy A9(2016), and Galaxy A9 Pro; and it boasts over five million users.

Since the beginning of 2016, competition in the mobile payment and fintech industry has become intense and more companies have launched mobile payment services. In 2015, Alibaba's Alipay gained 72.72% of the mobile payment market share in China, while Tencent's Tenpay had a 14.61% market share.