The Return of Ma Yun... Presents Business Direction and Returns to Alibaba Management

Alibaba founder Jack Ma has effectively returned to management after more than three years of seclusion by convening a company executive meeting.

According to local media including China's Wangyi News on the 20th, Jack Ma held an internal meeting last month with the top executives of Alibaba's e-commerce platform Taotian (Taobao and Tmall) to discuss future business directions. At the meeting, Ma emphasized, "Alibaba's past success methods may no longer be appropriate," and stressed, "We must hurry to reform." The meeting was reportedly attended by Dai San, CEO of Taotian Group, as well as Wang Hai, Liu Feng, Liu Yiman, and Cheng Daofang.

[Image source=AP Yonhap News]

Ma particularly called for improving the current pyramid-shaped organization by reducing top-level executives. He explained, "The changing environment presents opportunities for Taobao, not Tmall," and added, "We need to return to three directions centered on Taobao, users, and the internet." Taobao is Alibaba's main e-commerce platform focused on peer-to-peer transactions, while Tmall is a platform centered on business-to-consumer (B2C) transactions.

The reshuffling of the top management is expected to begin with the resignation of Alibaba Chairman and CEO Daniel Zhang. Local media such as Times Weekly reported that Zhang has decided to step down from his roles as group chairman and CEO to focus on the cloud business sector.

According to the company, Wu Yongming, chairman of the e-commerce division, is planned to succeed current CEO Zhang in September. Wu Yongming, a co-founder of Alibaba over 20 years ago and the newly appointed CEO candidate, is expected to concurrently serve as chairman of the e-commerce division. CEO Zhang will take on the roles of CEO and chairman of the Cloud Intelligence Group, and current vice chairman Cai Chongxin is expected to be promoted to group chairman.

In March, Alibaba carried out an organizational restructuring that split the group into six independent business units: Cloud Intelligence Group, Taobao·Tmall (e-commerce), Local Life (delivery platform), Cainiao (smart logistics group), Global Digital Business Group, and Digital Media Entertainment Group.

Daniel Zhang had been out of the public eye after Jack Ma publicly criticized regulatory authorities' crackdown on fintech (the combination of finance and digital technology) in October 2020, which led to pressure from the authorities. Mainly staying abroad, Ma has recently appeared publicly as the authorities declared support for private companies in sectors such as big tech to aid economic recovery. On the 12th, he was invited as a visiting professor at the University of Tokyo's "Tokyo College" and gave his first lecture. On the 17th, he attended the finals of the "Alibaba Global Mathematics Competition" hosted by Alibaba's research institute, DAMO Academy, and interacted with students and teachers via video conference.

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.