Mukesh Ambani announces Jio Money Merchant solutions to enable small businesses

Reliance Industries Chairman Mukesh Ambani made a few major announcements concerning Jio, today afternoon. The first announcement had to do with the Jio New Year Offer, which is basically Jio Welcome Offer extended to existing Jio users, as well as for users who activate their Jio SIMs after 4 December. The Jio New Year Offer is extended to 31 March 2017. The other major announcement was the launch of Jio Money Merchant Solutions.

Jio Money Merchant Solutions application will be available for download on 5 December. Customers can use their Jio Money wallets to make payments. These payments will happen through their bank accounts. Merchants can use the Jio Money Merchant Solutions to accept payments which will go directly to their bank accounts. The app also lets merchants make supplier payments, transfer money between their bank accounts and use digital petty cash. Over 10 million small merchant and retailers are expected to be signing up for the Merchant Solutions app across 17,000 towns and 4 lakh villages that Jio operates in.

Praising PM Modi’s demonetisation of older currency, Ambani said, “Digitally enabling transactions will help to create a fair, just, transparent and a strong India and Indian economy, It will bring an unprecedented accountability at every level. Every Indian will have a digital ATM in their hands.”

According to Ambani, enabling digital payments has laid the groundwork for low value and high volume credit. This should help farmers, small shopkeepers, traders and daily wage earners said Ambani.

Jio Money provides users a digital wallet that can be connected to their bank accounts. Thus enabling you to convert physical cash into digital cash and vice versa. Jio Money will be expanding its reach to millions of touch points where Aadhar cards based microATMs will be deployed.

Speaking about the importance of small merchants with regards to economy Ambani said, “To fuel their transactions, Jio is working to empower Indian merchants by building a digital retail ecosystem which we are calling Jio Money Merchant Solutions.”

This solution will enable digital transactions of all types irrespective of locations. Ambani mentioned this solution working in vegetable markets, small shops, restaurants, railway ticket counters, bus and mass transit and even person to person money transfer.

Disclaimer: Reliance Jio is owned by Reliance Industries, who also owns Network18, the publisher of Firstpost and tech2.