Chinese ecommerce giant Alibaba (BABA, Financial) is scheduled to report earnings on January 29, and just a few days back at the World Economic Forum, its founder and CEO, Jack Ma, stated, “Compared to 15 years ago we're big, compared to 15 years [from now], we're still a baby…” He emphasized that the ecommerce chain was still at its infancy stage and a lot more stands to be revealed in the near future. On the economic slowdown in China, Ma erased all concerns on slowing growth in China and it seemed as he was well prepared to take on the reality and move ahead of promoting Alibaba not as a Chinese ecommerce firm, but as a company doing business globally. Let’s check in and find out what was shared by the CEO which could possibly have a positive impact on the earnings of the quarter.
The giant is still to show phenomenal growth
Alibaba's CEO is not concerned with the slowness in growth rate of the Chinese economy and instead treats it as the positive signal reflecting that the country has become determined to focus on quality and not on quantity – a good sign that is required to stay to allow ample growth in China in the long run.
While commenting on Alibaba’s future prospects in the World Economic Forum at Davos, Switzerland, Ma revealed his ambition to serve 2 billion customers and in a way incubate 10 million small businesses outside China to sell their products. His sole aim remains to connect the American and Chinese businesses to the Chinese consumers, thereby, increasing the business from a mere Chinese firm to a global firm aiding other businesses to grow and prosper in this age.
He went ahead to state that he eventually hopes to build an "e-WTO" to facilitate and regulate trade between countries. He accepted that Alibaba is working towards making this ambition into a reality in the coming years and he emphasised that one day Alibaba might grow larger than the conventional Wal-Mart (WMT, Financial) store attracting most of its customers at one go. As the operating costs for Alibaba is almost minimal, achieving this aspiration might not seem that difficult for the ecommerce firm.
Notably, the now China’s richest man has spent seven long years to make one of the world’s well-acclaimed influential Internet retail companies or in his own words, giving “something in return”. The company is now worth $260 billion, being ahead of Facebook (FB, Financial) and IBM (IBM, Financial).
The company has gained quick popularity in China where it has already created 14 million jobs, either directly or indirectly. It connects small business houses to consumers, attracting over 100 million buyers a day and processing at least 60 million transactions per day. Now, the company is on an expansion spree and is a growing force in Asia, Brazil and Russia where it’s already one of the top three e-commerce entities.
In the coming future in the endeavour to serve at least 2 billion consumers, it’s trying to build a small business in Norway to sell its products to Argentina, and help the country folk buy things online from Switzerland.
Ma’s vision for the ecommerce giant is to harness the power of the Internet to grow and survive the business and in turn make money by helping other business houses make money.
Last word
Having set the stage on fire in China, Ma is eager to pursue his dreams for Alibaba on the global plane. Having achieved recognition at home, Ma has realized that it’s time to move outside the secure zone and start planning for hitting the global market and achieving a victory while doing business in the global platform. His comments at the World Economic Forum speak abound on such aspirations which will see the light of the day in proper time.
