Masterccard on Tuesday launched its first innovation lab in India in Pune to work on new commerce, payment and technology ideas for the rapidly growing digital economy in the country.

Mastercard Labs in India is the company’s ninth lab in the world and the second in Asia Pacific (following Singapore). In India, Mastercard Labs will work with financial institutions and merchant partners and the fintech community to identify and experiment with future technologies in a few key areas including digital payments, data solutions, financial inclusion, alternative payments and safety and security. The lab will also support and work with start-ups developing next generation, breakthrough commerce solutions through Mastercard’s Start Path programme.

“We are looking to deepen our active collaborations with governments, educational institutes, start- ups and businesses in India and revolutionise the market’s digital payments ecosystem to drive greater acceptance and adoption of electronic payments,” Tobias Puehse, Vice-President, Mastercard Labs, Asia Pacific, told BusinessLine. “The lab will bring out products specifically for the Indian market's growing financial needs.”

One of the first projects that the lab will be working on will be around giving farmers access to more buyers, enabling them to run a more profitable business and paving the way to a cashless agricultural sector. This will be based on Mastercard's existing product called 2KUZE, which was developed in Nairobi lab.

“We realise that India has unique requirements and so we'll not just copy paste a global solution for the Indian market. We will be meeting with farmers here to understand their needs and then build a solution for them,” Puehse said.

Mastercard Labs in Pune will focus on collaboration and co-creation with academia, fintech experts, technologists and developers based in India. It will identify and experiment with future technologies and drive new concepts and innovations through incubation, proof of concept, pilot and commercialisation, in order to deliver additional value to consumers and businesses of India.

Mastercard Labs in India is one of several broad-based collaborations Mastercard has launched India and the wider Asia Pacific region. This year, Mastercard co-innovated with the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) and other payments brands to develop Bharat QR, the world’s first interoperable Quick Response (QR) code acceptance solution, as part of a national push to streamline local electronic payments infrastructure.

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