The Profile of Western Union
Western Union was founded in 1851. At first, the company’s business was telegraph business. By 1860, the company’s telegraph network had been connected to the US East and West. In 1871, Western Union launched a remittance business with great foresight. In 1987, the struggling Western Union was acquired by Bennett LeBow with the help of junk bond king Milken. LeBow invited Robert Amman as the CEO of the company. Under the leadership of Amman, the company began a six-year business restructuring, focusing on the remittance business. Finally, in 2006, the company was separated from First Data as an independent remittance business.

Today, Western Union is the world’s largest remittance company with more than 20% of the global market share and one of the only two companies in the world that truly have a global remittance network. The company has 490,000 cooperative outlets in more than 200 countries and regions, including outlets with local banks, and employs 7,000 people.

The industry introduction of Western Union
The business competition in the personal remittance industry is fierce. Banks, credit card companies, online remittance service providers, etc., which compete with Western Union for this business. As a leader in the industry, Western Union’s market share is less than 20%. Western Union wants to win consumers through branding, fast, convenient and multiple choices of remittances. In addition, Western Union remittances rely on lower prices to attract remitters, and there is no ability to constantly raise prices. The company’s global network is its biggest competitive advantage. The scale effect also brings a large cost advantage to the company. In the future, the company still has the opportunity to continue to use its cost advantages to squeeze small competitors in the industry.

The growth strategy of Western Union

The company strategy of Western Union is the international expansion, especially for the low-income population with a global income of 1.5 to 2.5 billion daily income of less than 2 US dollars. On the regional front, the low-margin Asian region is still the biggest driver of growth, and North America will maintain a small increase as the economy recovers.

In November 2015, the world’s payment service leader, Western Union Remittance Company (NYSE: WU) and Tencent Holdings Ltd.’s leading social platform WeChat announced today that an agreement has been reached for US WeChat users to reach 200 via Western Union’s WU Connect platform. National and regional remittances.

In April 2017, payment services company Western Union (Western Union) announced yesterday that US users can now pay for Apple Pay in their iOS app, sending money to US domestic payees or payees in more than 200 countries around the world. The company said that Apple Pay will make it easier to make domestic bill payments within its iOS app, and users can tap the Touch ID to access their stored bank card information.