Western Union unveils fintech centre in India
Western Union has launched its Western Union Technology Engineering Centre (WUTEC) in India to unleash innovation and investment in engineering resources.
WUTEC India will focus on building products and solutions for the digital and retail sectors. The new 125,000 square feet facility in Pune, Maharashtra will serve as the company’s hub in the region, employing more than 1,000 individuals.
Hikmet Ersek, president and CEO of Western Union, says it will “join our other key technology centres across the world to expand the reach of our omni-channel platform, integrating our digital efforts with our iconic physical agent network”.
The firm says remittances are “key to India’s economy” and cites data from the World Bank that the nation continues to be the “largest remittance receiving country in the world” with an estimated $62.7 billion received in 2016, and 2017 data is expected to show a rise to $65 billion.
Western Union’s other tech centres include Denver, Montvale (New Jersey) and San Francisco in the US. These are investing in a range of technologies, including robotics, machine learning, predictive modelling and biometrics.
You got competition
By the way, as reported last year, PayPal set up two innovation labs in India – based out of the company’s tech centres in Chennai and Bangalore – to help the country’s fintech start-ups grow.
The two labs will explore digital payments, artificial intelligence (AI), virtual reality (VR), augmented reality (AR), data and analytics, internet of things (IoT) and robotics.
