MANILA - The popular convenience store chain 7-Eleven is "investing heavily" in its digital payment system and e-commerce services, its operator said on Thursday.

Philippine Seven Corp., the 7-Eleven operator in the country, has invested a total of P50 million in digital in the first half of 2018, its president and CEO Jose Victor Paterno told reporters.

"We’ve been investing quite heavily in digital. You’ve seen our wallet and e-commerce store. It is likely we will continue to be in investment mode for the next couple of years," he said.

Aside from its CLiQQ payment kiosk, 7-Eleven introduced CLiQQ Pay in December 2017 that allowed consumers to pay for items from the store using reward points stored in their e-wallets.

CLiQQ shop was also introduced as part of its offline to online e-commerce venture where goods bought via the web would be available for pick-up in 7-Eleven outlets.

Such method would result in "low acquisition costs and superior unit economics," Paterno said.

"We're not only capitalizing on revenue opportunities presented by the payment and logistics needs of digital players in an emerging market, but we're becoming a digital player ourselves," Paterno said.

Paterno said the CLiQQ app was one of the most downloaded applications recently and has contributed to the growth of 7-Eleven's consumer base.

"We found it's easier for us to acquire customers because they trust the brand and because they can just go the stores to redeem items," he said.