BAKU, Azerbaijan, Mar. 30
By Eldar Janashvili - Trend:
Azerbaijan is one of the financial markets which are most open to the innovations, Regional manager for Caucasus at Visa Christina Doros told Trend.
"On the one hand, such openness of the Azerbaijani market has been stipulated by the fact that consumers, in principle, are open to innovations and are interested in using new payment instruments," Doros added.
"On the other hand, there is a positive influence of regulators, namely, the Central Bank of Azerbaijan (CBA), the Center for Economic Reforms Analysis and Communication, which are technologically advanced structures and which clearly understand the importance of the introduction of cashless payments for the country," the regional manager added.
"The first Visa Cashless Forum in Azerbaijan, which was held in the country with their active participation and support and brought together all the key market players, testifies to this," Doros said.
Doros stressed that Visa is actively and fruitfully cooperating with regulators on the implementation of the current program.
"The purpose of the program is to increase the number and volume of cashless payments," the regional manager added.
"Visa is working to maximally increase the volume of non-cash payments," Doros said. "To achieve this goal, we use various tools and approaches, beginning with the introduction of technologies such as contactless payments, tokenization services, and ending with various marketing initiatives and loyalty campaigns. All this is required to increase the number of non-cash payments. This way we help the government to develop the non-cash economy."
"We are active partners of banks, the Central Bank, Center for Economic Reforms Analysis and Communication and other key players in the Azerbaijani financial market," Doros said. "Having global expertise and long experience in the field of payments, we share information on new technologies and trends in the development of digital payments. We render our technologies, thereby helping the creators of the state program to shape it as closely as possible to the modern realities of the digital sphere."
"Involving as many consumers as possible in the payment ecosystem and providing them with fast, convenient and safe payment solutions, a payment card or another payment instrument, is one of Visa’s main tasks in Azerbaijan," Doros added. "Visa pays special attention to the development of contactless payments, including mobile payments and the further implementation of tokenization projects."
"Tokenization and mobile payments contribute to the digitalization of the sector," the regional manager added. "Moreover, we are working on the introduction of Visa Tap to Phone technology. It allows turning any smartphone based on the Android operating system with NFC functionality into a terminal for receiving contactless payments. Thereby, it helps small and medium enterprises start accepting contactless payments by using a telephone and greatly expand the network for receiving payments in the country."