(Yicai Global) Oct. 17 -- Ant Group's Alipay has launched a new function to make it easier for users to transfer money to friends who are using a rival e-wallet developed by Tencent Holdings.

The function, released yesterday, does not support direct transfers to WeChat Pay, but users can share a generated QR code with their WeChat friends to transfer money to their Alipay accounts.

The feature has received a mixed reception. Some netizens said it makes transfers more convenient if users do not want to share their Alipay account information with the other party. However, some said the process is cumbersome.

Alipay's customer service said that the function is still in the stage of collecting user feedback and further development to facilitate the transaction of funds between users who are not Alipay friends.

Fintech researchers told Yicai Global that from the perspective of user experience, this new feature does not bring significant convenience to the two sides of transactions. But it makes use of WeChat's user traffic.

Ant's affiliate Alibaba Group Holding and Tencent, two Chinese internet giants, are increasingly pushed to open up their ecosystems. In March, it was reported that Alibaba's e-commerce marketplace Taobao began internal testing to use WeChat Pay on some users and products.

Since November, WeChat users have been able to open Taobao links without logging in on Alipay. Moreover, Alibaba’s takeout platform Ele.me accepts WeChat Pay.

Editors: Shi Yi, Emmi Laine, Xiao Yi