Smart Business

FOREWORD

In 1995, I traveled to America and saw the internet for the first time. When I searched for “China beer” on the internet, I found nothing. Seeing the lack of results, I decided to go back and start a company to bring the internet to China, and to bring China to the rest of the world. Back then, there was no online business in China. Now, the internet is everywhere. I cannot believe how far the world has come.

Alibaba has also come a long way from the eighteen people gathered in my small apartment back in 1999. We had a dream of transforming the poor business practices around us using new internet technologies. Today, we serve hundreds of millions of consumers and millions of businesses all over the world. We have grown large by helping ...