A Xiaomi India spokesperson said on Friday that Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi Corp has closed its financial services business in India, four years after its launch.
“As part of the annual strategic evaluation activity and as a response to our focus on core business services, we closed Mi Financial Services in March 2022,” a company spokesperson said.
The company’s Mi Pay app, which allowed users to make bill payments and money transfers, is no longer listed among the recognized third-party Unified Payments Interface (UPI) apps on the National Payments Corporation of India (NPCI) website.
NPCI – an industry body that oversees India’s state-backed peer-to-peer payments network, popularly known as UPI – declined to comment.
Xiaomi recently pulled its Mi Credit, which connects smartphone users to lending firms for quick loans, and the Mi Pay app from the local Play Store and its own app store, TechCrunch reported earlier on Friday.
In India, Xiaomi’s strongest market outside China, the company is under government scrutiny for allegedly dodging tax regulators.
In April, India’s Federal Financial Crimes Agency froze Xiaomi’s assets worth $676 million, accusing the company of making illegal remittances to foreign entities in the form of royalty payments.
The Chinese smartphone conglomerate, which denies any wrongdoing, has said the action “effectively halted” its operations in its key Indian market.
Political tensions following border clashes in 2020 have caused many Chinese companies to struggle to do business in India.
India has since banned more than 300 Chinese apps, citing security concerns, including popular apps like TikTok, and tighter rules for Chinese companies investing in India. ,Reuters
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