Ant International is advancing its role as a digital financial infrastructure provider in emerging markets, supporting over 2 billion cross-border transactions by 2025 across Southeast Asia, South Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America. Its core focus is expanding digital financial and commercial solutions powered by AI to unlock growth for entrepreneurs, especially small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), which account for over 90% of its global customer base exceeding 150 million users.
While many may not be familiar with Ant Group, they likely recognize Alipay as the app used for online shopping in China or for payments during international travel. In reality, Alipay was just the starting point of a fintech empire that has since grown into Ant Group (formerly Ant Financial Services Group).
As the business expanded, Ant Group’s role evolved from an "app provider" to a builder of financial infrastructure encompassing payments, lending, risk management, and cross-border trade connectivity. For its overseas markets, Ant Group separated its international business as Ant International, specifically overseeing expansion outside China.
Under Ant International, the company offers not only Alipay but also multiple platforms and solutions working together across users, merchants, and global enterprises. Its financial innovations are categorized into four main pillars:
Alipay+ serves as a gateway linking international digital wallets. Its significance lies not only in cross-border payments but also in integrating e-wallets, super apps, national QR codes, and card networks to work together.
In Southeast Asia, Alipay+ connects with national QR codes in five countries: Singapore’s SGQR, Malaysia’s PayNet, South Korea’s ZeroPay, Cambodia’s KHQR, and Sri Lanka’s LankaPay. This enables Alipay+ users to easily pay for goods and services worldwide by simply scanning a QR code. Currently, Alipay+ links more than 1.8 billion user accounts from 40 partners with merchants across over 100 markets worldwide.
> Read more Alipay+: China’s Cross-Border Payment Network, Jack Ma’s Financial Innovation Influencing the World
Antom is a merchant payment acceptance platform designed to simplify cross-channel and cross-border payments. Its standout feature is the practical use of AI, such as Antom Copilot, an intelligent assistant that reduces payment system integration time by up to 95%, along with Payment Orchestration & Smart Routing systems that select the payment route with the highest real-time success rate.
Access to funding remains a major bottleneck for SMEs in emerging markets. Bettr serves as an embedded finance infrastructure providing lending technology through digital platforms. This model enables lending at points where real data exists, such as e-wallets or super apps, reducing risk and costs while expanding financial opportunities for smaller entrepreneurs. Currently, Bettr supports over 30 million users and has expanded into Latin America through investment in R2, a leading embedded lending infrastructure provider in that region.
WorldFirst offers a global business account solution for receiving, paying, and managing cross-border funds all within one account. Serving over 1.2 million customers worldwide, it supports transactions in more than 210 countries, over 100 currencies, and across 130+ e-commerce platforms. This facilitates SMEs and online businesses to trade internationally without needing multiple accounts or banks.
All these factors enable Ant International to handle over 2 billion digital transactions annually and play a pivotal role in emerging markets worldwide. Moreover, this shift illustrates that the center of fintech growth is moving from developed countries to "emerging markets."
An overview of business development and innovation throughout the past year Da Glas Feigin, President of Ant International, revealed that when access must lead to real growth, Ant International views SMEs as the backbone of emerging market economies. Currently, the company serves over 150 million entrepreneurs worldwide, with 90% being small and medium-sized enterprises.
However, in reality, a major problem for SMEs is that many remain trapped in disconnected infrastructures—fragmented payment systems, limited access to credit, high cross-border transaction costs, and technological complexities beyond the capacity of small businesses.
This has driven Ant International to focus on empowering SMEs through payment services with Alipay+, 2C2P, and Antom infrastructures; access to banking and digital lending via Bettr; and digital accounts plus risk management and growth tools through WorldFirst, which supports rapidly expanding cross-border trade. All solutions are designed to operate seamlessly behind the scenes without adding burdens to entrepreneurs, especially in emerging markets where SMEs often lack IT teams, large finance departments, and must manage everything simultaneously.
On the platform technology side, Ant International has enhanced cross-border remittance efficiency by processing over $600 billion in transactions via blockchain, operating 24/7, with over 95% of transactions settled within the same day. Additionally, Ant International and SWIFT recently pioneered “Bank-to-Wallet” payments, enabling bank customers worldwide to send money directly to digital wallets conveniently.
Regarding Thailand, Feigin stated that in its overseas expansion, Thailand was among the first markets where Ant International chose to invest and develop payment infrastructures, beginning with Alipay and expanding to other services. Thailand is viewed as a market with strong SMEs and widespread digital payment infrastructure, especially with rapidly developing banks and fintech companies.
At the same time, many SMEs and small entrepreneurs still lack true access to financial services, particularly in digital lending aligned with digital behavior, multi-channel cash management tools, and cross-border business expansion.
From being known as a payment app for Chinese tourists, Thailand has become a strategic market for Alipay+, the operational base for 2C2P by Antom, and a testing ground for AI fintech solutions for SMEs and global enterprises.
Ant International today is no longer just a payment service provider but is positioning itself as a "global financial infrastructure" that enables SMEs and small merchants worldwide to overcome traditional constraints in capital, technology, and business borders, allowing them to grow within a unified global economic framework alongside international players.
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