Business Success Documentary - Story of Alibaba & Jack Ma - From Start till Now!!

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• published: 23 Nov 2014
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Alibaba Group Holding Limited (NYSE: BABA) is a Chinese e-commerce company that provides consumer-to-consumer, business-to-consumer and business-to-business sales services via web portals. It also provides electronic payment services, a shopping search engine and data-centric cloud computing services. The group began in 1999 when Jack Ma founded the website Alibaba.com, a business-to-business portal to connect Chinese manufacturers with overseas buyers. In 2012, two of Alibaba’s portals handled 1.1 trillion yuan ($170 billion) in sales. The company primarily operates in the People’s Republic of China (PRC), and at closing time, on the date of its historic initial public offering (IPO), 19 September 2014, Alibaba's market value was measured as US$231 billion. In September 2013, the company sought an IPO in the United States after a deal could not be reached with Hong Kong regulators. Planning occurred over 12 months before the company's market debut in September 2014. The Alibaba Reuters Instrument Code is "BABA.N", while the pricing of the IPO initially raised US$21.8 billion, which later increased to US$25 billion, making it the largest IPO in history. However, buyers weren't purchasing actual shares in the group, since China forbids foreign ownership, but rather just shares in a Cayman Islands shell corporation. Alibaba's consumer-to-consumer portal Taobao, similar to eBay.com, features nearly a billion products and is one of the 20 most-visited websites globally. The Group's websites accounted for over 60% of the parcels delivered in China by March 2013, and 80% of the nation's online sales by September 2014. Alipay, an online payment escrow service, accounts for roughly half of all online payment transactions within China. Alibaba is planning to enter India and was in talks with Snapdeal in September 2014. Alibaba reported sale of more than $9 billion on China's Singles' Day in 2014. FOUNDING: The company was founded in current chairman Jack Ma's apartment. Ma explained: "One day I was in San Francisco in a coffee shop, and I was thinking Alibaba is a good name. And then a waitress came, and I said, "Do you know about Alibaba?" And she said yes. I said, "What do you know about Alibaba?", and she said, "Open Sesame". And I said, "Yes, this is the name!" Then I went onto the street and found 30 people and asked them, "Do you know Alibaba?" People from India, people from Germany, people from Tokyo and China … they all knew about Alibaba. Alibaba — open sesame. Alibaba is a kind, smart business person, and he helped the village. So … easy to spell, and globally known. Alibaba opens sesame for small- to medium-sized companies. We also registered the name "Alimama", in case someone wants to marry us!"" Brick and mortar stores: According to Li Chuan, a senior executive at Alibaba, the company was planning in 2013 to open traditional brick and mortar retail outlets in partnership with Chinese real estate company Wanda. Additionally, Alibaba purchased a 25% stake in Hong Kong-based Intime Retail in early 2014. Historic Alibaba IPO: On 5 September 2014, the group—in a regulatory filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission—set a US$60- to $66- per-share price range for its scheduled initial public offering (IPO), the final price of which would be determined after an international roadshow. The listing on the New York Stock Exchange (NYSE) was expected to raise more than $20 billion, making it the largest technology listing in U.S. history, exceeding that of Facebook. A roadshow, commencing with U.S. cities New York, Boston, Baltimore, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Denver—and extending to Singapore, Hong Kong and London—began on 5 September 2014, and was expected to last until 18 September 2014. Ma explained that an aim of the roadshow was to gauge the investor interest in Alibaba shares. On 18 September 2014, Alibaba's IPO priced at US$68, raising US$21.8 billion for the company and investors. Alibaba is the biggest U.S. IPO in history. On 19 September 2014, Alibaba's shares (BABA) began trading on the NYSE at an opening price of $92.70 at 11:55am EST. On 22 September 2014, Alibaba's underwriters announced their confirmation that they had exercised a greenshoe option to sell 15% more shares than originally planned, boosting the total amount of the IPO to $25 billion.