Ant Financial, the payments unit of Chinese Web giant Alibaba, is looking into the use of blockchain technology as it sets its sights on boosting its user numbers to two billion people within the next decade.
Ant Financial has secured huge success in China's booming mobile money market, with its Alipay mobile wallet already used by more than 450 million people.
However, the firm's CEO, Eric Jing, says that he wants to build a global player, telling CNBC that "we want to serve two billion people in the next 10 years by using technology, by working together with partners...to serve those underserved.
To do this, last year the company raised a whopping $4.5 billion in a series B funding round which will help drive deals such as its acquisition of a 40% stake in India's Paytm.
And in the future, underpinning the Ant services could be blockchain technology, which Jing says Ant Financial is exploring, alongside cloud computing, biometrics and artificial intelligence.