4 Reasons Why Facial Recognition Payments are Popular in China

On March 18th, WeChat Pay officially launched a desktop face recognition cash register called "Frog". In February, UnionPay's also unveil their face payment solution at the 7th China International Self-Service Expo. When Alipay launched the face-scan payment machine "Dragonfly" in December last year, WeChat and UnionPay followed up with the facial Recognition payment system.

Face Recognition Cash Register of Wechat Pay

The 3 major payment giants in China, Alipay, WeChat, and UnionPay, have been making efforts to boost “pay with faces” in the commercial field in the past two years. Why?

1. Technology Maturity of Face Recognition

From the perspective of technology maturity, face-scan POS devices launched by these three companies mostly use 3D structured light cameras and artificial intelligence algorithms. The face recognition algorithm accurately measures the 3-dimensional information of human faces such as the depth of the face and the height of the nose by the light distance. 

At the same time, combined with the live detection technology and the big data risk control system, it can quickly and accurately capture the facial features and reject the 2D image in the photos and video. The recognition accuracy is above 99.9%, reaching the financial level of security.

Face Recognition POS Machine of Alipay

The face recognition cash register usually has deep learning ability. The face cash register can remember the face of the regular customer. After paying with face, this customer doesn’t need to input the mobile phone number next time.

Telpo face recognition cash register TPS650 is also equipped with 3D structured light camera, which can intelligently and accurately recognize faces, effectively defend against 3D masks or print photos.

Telpo face recognition machine TPS650 

2. Easy to operate

From the point of view of operability, these cash registers with face scanner are compact, but they can be integrated with multiple payment methods such as face recognition and QR-code scanner.

Users only need to stand in front of this kind of cash registers and align the face recognition camera on the cash register. It automatically completes the identification and payment. The whole process takes only a few seconds. In the case that the user's mobile phone has no power, the network has no signal or is inconvenient to take the mobile phone, the face payment can provide users with various convenient payment options. This modern system has greater appeal to the younger consumer.

3. Improving the In-store Efficiency

From the perspective of improving the efficiency of the store, it can speed up the checkout efficiency. If it takes 60 seconds to settle 10 items, then the face recognition payment can be completed in 10 seconds. According to reports, after the introduction of brush face payment, one of the most famous bakery chain stores in China has increased checkout efficiency by more than 60%, while reducing labor costs.

4. Introduction Cost

In terms of cost of introduction, The general self-service payment machine with face recognition is expensive. So, general merchants cannot afford it. The desktop face cash registers “Dragonfly” can significantly reduce equipment costs. It is only one-tenth the size of a traditional self-service machine. Plug and play, no need to install additional development plug-ins, saving 80% of the cost. So that small retailer can afford it.

Self-service Kiosk pay with face recognition

According to statistics, the global face recognition market has grown by 166.6% in recent years which expected to reach US$2.4 billion by 2020. At the recent International Organization for Standardization (ISO) meeting, Alipay-led biometric international standards were approved by many countries. The reason why Chinese companies have the right to speak on international standards is also the maturity of domestic biometrics and software and hardware industries. 

At the same time, China is also the largest consumer market for biometric devices. According to data released by Ant Financial, as of the end of 18, more than 300 KFCs in more than 100 cities across the country have introduced the use of brush face payment cash registers. Face recognition smart hardware is more used in retail catering, smart security, smart medical and other scenarios.

Telpo face recognition machines

Face recognition technology will bring consumers a more convenient experience, but also bring business upgrades to the merchants.

Tag: Face Recognition, cash register,payment,Dragonfly,face scanner,China,biometrics,smart hardware,Self-service,WeChat

Brief Introduction: Telpo is a professional smart payment partner who focuses on the ODM service 20 years. It mainly provides the EFT-POS, cash registers, biometric devices, face recognition machines, self-service kiosks, and bus validators. Telpo has served for more than 1000 customers abroad, including government, banks, Telecom operators, police stations, retail shops, and offices. Telpo adheres to R&D and innovation, aiming to provide more intelligent hardware for global partners.