THE MAN BEHIND THE ALIBABA GROUP. INC

JACK MA

Jack Ma is the first Chinese entrepreneur in the last fifty years to be on the cover page of Forbes Magazine. He is the founder of the Alibaba Group. He started his journey as a teacher for which he earned $12 a month, Now he is among the richest people in China. His ideas were discouraged by everyone at the beginning of his career but the worth of his ideas brought him a fortune. 

                                 

HIS PASSION OVER ENGLISH

Jack Ma was born on 10 September 1964 in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, in a poor family. In his childhood, he liked the English language very much and always wanted to learn English, but back then English speaking people were very much less. It became a tourist place when the president of America Nixon came to Hangzhou and said he liked it very much. Jack Ma thought that this is the right time to learn English. Every day he used to cycle for more than 45 minutes (nearly 17 miles) to Hangzhou tourist hotel, where he used to give a tour to some of the tourists and practices his English. He worked as a free tourist guide for more than 9 years in order to learn English. A tourist called him Jack finding his Chinese name difficult. 

EDUCATION

He had some difficulties in completing his graduation, he failed two times. After completing his graduation in his third attempt, Jack Ma applied for Harvard University which he got rejected for ten times. Later he completed a bachelor's degree in English at Hangzhou Normal University. 

HARD TIME FINDING JOB

After his graduation, he had some difficult time finding a job. He tried for more than 30 jobs, where he got rejected each time. He even tried of becoming police where he got rejected again. Then he started teaching English at a University in China. Because of his skills in English, he started his own translation consultancy. As a part of his new company, he went to the US for the first time in 1995, where he was kind of kidnapped. An American held a gun at him without his will. Despite this he found his journey fascinating where he found the "Internet" for the first time.

THE INTERNET AND CHINA PAGES

He first time saw the internet and computer and amazed by it. His first internet search was "Beer". While he was on that he didn't find anything or any websites from China. Those were the days when the internet isn't explored in China. He saw the potential of the internet and thought of starting his own company. To start the company he was needed $3000 for which he went to the banks for a loan who eventually declined. He gathered some money from friends and family and started the China Pages. In 1995, they registered the domain China Pages. After seeing China Pages so many investors contacted Jack Ma. He then started building websites for companies. 

THE ALIBABA GROUP 

In 1999 he started the Alibaba Group with his friends. It is an e-commerce website where we can buy things. In san Francisco streets he asked about the name Alibaba, everyone knew it because of the famous tale Alibaba and the Forty Thieves and it also starts with 'A' which appears in the top when someone searches. It started with some negativity and just in its growth the company had its losses with the burst of the dot-com bubble. During this, all internet-related companies had their losses. At the beginning of Alibaba, they didn't have many profits. At that time Goldman Sachs and Softbank invested $25 million in Alibaba. 

TAOBAO Vs EBAY

In 2003 Jack Ma launched Taobao an online shopping company. At the start, Taobao didn't have any customers so Jack Ma and other founders sold and bought their things in it to generate traffic. Taobao had a tough opponent eBay. During the dot-com bubble burst, eBay was the only internet company which got its profits. But Taobao gave some tough competition by offers and eventually, eBay lost its spot in China.

LEGACY 

 He loved the movie Forest Gump and the title character. He also said that he used to look up to the title character and how it inspired him.

                       

Alibaba during its entry to the New York Stock Exchange in 2014 had pocketed around $25 billion. In a single day, Jack Ma became the richest person in China. Alibaba has the largest IPO ever recorded. He is even a great philanthropist and donated millions of dollars. Starting in a room with Jack Ma and his friends Alibaba Group now became one of the largest companies in the world. 

"Today is difficult, tomorrow is much more difficult, but the day after tomorrow is beautiful. Most people die tomorrow evening." 

                                   -- JACK MA

Image source-Google

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