Apple Pay set to debut in China on Feb. 18
Apple Pay will launch in China on Thursday, Feb. 18, one of Apple's partner banks revealed on Chinese social media.
A chatbot for the China Guangfa Bank disclosed the date on an official account on WeChat.
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A Chinese tech blog captured one of the chatbot conversations:
The second speech bubble says: "Apple Pay will go live on the 18th of February, 5 a.m. in the morning."
Apple announced in December that Apple Pay would come to China in "early 2016." Apple China's website lists 19 banks as partners. China will be the fifth country to get Apple Pay, after the U.S., Canada, the UK and Australia.
China has been an increasingly important part of Apple's global ambitions. Greater China recently surpassed Europe as Apple's second-largest market by revenue, after the Americas. While Tim Cook said in January the company has recently encountered "softness" in the Chinese market, the reportedly imminent 4-inch iPhone -- which is said to include Apple Pay -- could give Apple's fortunes in China a boost this spring.
Additional reporting by Vicki Ho.
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Topics Apple
Pete Pachal was Mashable’s Tech Editor and had been at the company from 2011 to 2019. He covered the technology industry, from self-driving cars to self-destructing smartphones.Pete has covered consumer technology in print and online for more than a decade. Originally from Edmonton, Canada, Pete first uploaded himself into technology journalism at Sound & Vision magazine in 1999. Pete also served as Technology Editor at Syfy, creating the channel's technology site, DVICE (now Blastr), out of some rusty HTML code and a decompiled coat hanger. He then moved on to PCMag, where he served as the site's News Director.Pete has been featured on Fox News, the Today Show, Bloomberg, CNN, CNBC and CBC.Pete holds degrees in journalism from the University of King's College in Halifax and engineering from the University of Alberta in Edmonton. His favorite Doctor Who monsters are the Cybermen.
