Paytm, the digital payments enterprise launched his mini-app store to help India-based developers, in a direct contest to Google’s dominance in the space.

The launch of the store comes after the app was temporarily removed on 18th September from Google’s Play Store for violating developer rules on real-money gaming.

While the removal of the app might have acted as a trigger, the digital payments company’s action is probably the direct outcome of Google’s move of making it compulsory for the developers listed on its Play Store to use its billing system. Google charges a 30% commission on any transaction made for a digital service or product via its in-app billing system.

Paytm stated that its mini-app store can support developers to take their products to the masses and is offering a listing and distribution of these mini-apps in its application.

Paytm confirmed that over 300 apps, including Ola, Decathlon, Netmeds, Domino’s Pizza, Rapido, 1MG, NoBroker, and FreshMenu, have joined its app store.

Startup founders like Razorpay’s Harshil Mathur, Paytm’s Vijay Shekhar Sharma, and 50 other founders, discussed the probability of building an Indian app store to compete with Google.

The Internet and Mobile Association of India (Iamai), which has numerous startups as members, sought a joint strategy to tackle this problem. Iamai stated that it is planning a meeting with the founder member to understand their problems and solve them.

The founder of CCAvenue and Payments Council of India’s chairman, Vishwas Patel, stated that Just because it owns a gateway to the digital ecosystem, Google should not act randomly and impose its rules and regulations that are conflicting to the Indian laws. While Google argues that it does not require RBI authorization as it is not the operator of the payment system, it is also making it mandatory that Indian apps only use Google’s payment and billing system. The tech giant should not exercise its foremost position, instead, it should allow a level-playing field for everyone, Patel added.

Source: https://www.livemint.com/technology/tech-news/paytm-launches-its-own-mini-app-store-11601830976822.html