China's leading ATM company GRG Banking announced plans to join Cashless Alliance and the company said they would launch innovative products to better meet the demands of the cashless society in the future.
The Cashless Alliance was initiated by Ant Financial and UN Environment. Formally established in April 2017, the first batch of members of the alliance include Alipay, Carrefour China, Beijing Capital International Airport, Huaqiang Electronic World, and ofo.
A report on the overall operation of payment system for the fourth quarter of 2016 published by the People's Bank of China showed that financial organizations, including state-owned banks, purchased about 103,000 ATMs, a decrease of about 14.88% compared with the 121,000 ATMs in 2015. At the same time, statistics from many banks showed that in 2016, 90% clients could complete banking businesses without going to the counters of the banks; and only 70% clients did so two years ago.
Facing the new trend of cashless society, GRG Banking has started distributing Video Teller Machines and increasing R&D investment in blockchain, intelligent systems, big data, and biometric identification, aiming to launch innovative products to meet the demands of a cashless society.
GRG Banking said that a cashless society does not mean it must eliminate cash, but instead to improve social efficacy for cashless services.