In August, Tencent released the latest version of WeChat, a popular social networking mobile app, to include payment integration functions, empowering its more than 300 million users to make purchases on several e-commerce platforms.

Lu Zhenwang, an independent Internet analyst and the chief executive officer of Shanghai-based Wanqing Consultancy, said that WeChat's payment function is a "game changer", in that it largely combines online and offline businesses by using the phone rather than a personal computer.

Therefore, the introduction of sound wave technology by Alipay is largely a symbolic move that aims to differentiate itself from WeChat, which features barcode scanning, said Sun Hongchao, an IT columnist at NetEase Inc, a leading Internet portal in China.

"While it's becoming a trend that companies are joining the ranks of Internet businesses and rolling out solutions to allow customers to buy goods and services in shops using their smartphones, the variety of payment solutions being introduced is making consumers and merchants alike perplexed," said Sun.

He pointed out examples such as near-field communication, or NFC, technology, face-recognition software and proprietary hardware that plugs into devices, each falling into a different technological category. He called for a unified standard to allow a quicker and seamless adoption of online-to-offline payments.