South Korea’s commercial bank Woori Bank Co. will join hands with Vietnam-based mobile banking service provider M-Service, a move that is expected to be a key stepping stone to the Korean bank’s advancement into the Southeast Asian financial market.

According to bank industry sources on Monday, Woori Bank is expected to sign a memorandum of understanding with M-Service on Tuesday to collaborate on developing and marketing mobile money transfer service. M-Service is the top wireless payment firm in Vietnam with 1 million subscribers and about 4,000 offline channels. It raked in around 150 billion won ($137 million) in sales last year.

Woori Bank plans to launch the mobile money transfer service that will allow its users, especially targeting Vietnamese employees working in Korea and their family members in Vietnam, to easily send and receive money through the bank’s own mobile banking service platforms WiBee Bank and WiBee Talk, only using mobile phone numbers. It will also offer a mobile payment service through M-Service’s mobile wallet Mo-Mo. The bank aims to complete the development of the new wireless money transfer service by December this year.

Earlier this month, Woori Bank received temporary approval from the Vietnamese central bank to set up a local subsidiary in Vietnam, and the lender plans to open the local entity in Hanoi around October this year. Currently, the bank operates two offices in the country - each in Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh.

Moreover, Woori Bank plans to enter the Vietnamese credit card market together with its sister firm Woori Card in the first half of next year. It aims to provide a comprehensive financial service ranging from mortgage-backed housing loan services to integrated banking and insurance services, commonly known as bancassurance, and compete with Shinhan Bank, another Korea lender that has also made forays into the Vietnamese market earlier.

Woori Bank has opened 200 financial service outlets across the world by November last year, becoming the first Korean bank with the largest number of offices abroad. The bank has set an ambitious goal to increase the number of its overseas offices to 400 by the end of this year and 500 by 2020. As part of its efforts to expand its global presence, it is mulling mergers and acquisitions with lenders in Southeast Asian countries including a savings bank in the Philippines.

The bank has also set a target to up the share of its overseas revenue in its total operating profit to 30 percent by 2020 from the current 10 percent.

By Park Joon-hyung

[ⓒ Pulse by Maeil Business News Korea & mk.co.kr, All rights reserved]