Table of Contents
EARLY LIFE
- Ma was born on 10 September 1964 in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China. He began studying English at a young age by conversing with English-speakers at Hangzhou international hotel
- Later in his youth, Ma struggled attending college. Ma attended Hangzhou Teacher’s Institute (currently known as Hangzho Normal University) and graduated in 1988 with a B.A. in English.
- While at school, Ma was head of the student council. After graduation, he became a lecturer in English and International Trade at Hangzhou Dianzi University. CAREER
- Ma applied for 30 different jobs and got rejected by all. In addition to this, he applied ten times to Harvard Business School (HBS) and got rejected.
- In 1994, Ma heard about the Internet. In early 1995, he went to the US with his friends, who helped introduce him to the Internet.
- He also tried to search for general information about China and again was surprised to find none.
- So he and his friend created an “ugly” website related to China.This was when Ma realized that the Internet had something great to offer
CAREER
- In April 1995, Ma, his wife Cathy and a friend raised US$20,000 and started their first company.
- Their company was dedicated to creating websites for companies and he named it “China Pages”.
- Within three years, the company had made 5,000,000 Chinese Yuan which at the time was equivalent to US$800,000.
- Ma began building websites for Chinese companies with the help of friends in the US.
ALIBABA
- From 1998 to 1999, Ma headed an information technology company established by the China International Electronic Commerce Center, a department of the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation. • In 1999, he quit and returned to Hangzhou with his team to found Alibaba, a China-based business-tobusiness marketplace site in his apartment with a group of 18 friends. He started a new round of venture development with 500,000 yuan.
ALIBABA
- In October 1999 and January 2000, Alibaba twice won a total of a $25 million foreign venture capital investment.
- The program was expected to improve the domestic ecommerce market and perfect an e-commerce platform for Chinese enterprises, especially small and mediumsized enterprises (SMEs), to address World Trade Organization (WTO) challenges
ALIBABA
- In September 2014 it was reported Alibaba was raising over $25 billion in an initial public offering (IPO) on the New York Stock Exchange.
- Alibaba became one of the most valuable technology companies in the world after raising the full $25 billion, the largest initial public offering in US financial history.
- Ma served as executive chairman of Alibaba Group, which is a holding company with nine major subsidiaries.
- In November 2012, Alibaba’s online transaction volume exceeded one trillion yuan. ALIBABA Ma announced on 10 September 2018 that he will step down as executive chairman of Alibaba Group Holding in the coming year
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