By Yin Lei
Jack Ma, chairman of Alibaba Group Holding Limited, announced on Monday that he would resign from his current post a year from now.
His announcement, released via the official account of Alibaba on China’s social media platform Weibo, also said that Daniel Zhang, currently the CEO of Alibaba, would take over from him on Sept. 10, 2019. After his resignation as chairman, Jack Ma will stay on Alibaba’s board of directors for another year until this company’s annual shareholder’s meeting in 2020.
In this message to Alibaba’s customers, colleagues and shareholders, Jack Ma expressed his confidence in Alibaba’s healthy operations in his absence.
“Our novel partnership mechanism, unique corporate culture and rich talent pool have laid a solid institutional foundation for Alibaba’s leadership transition, which had been underpinning Alibaba’s five years of smooth operations since I quitted the CEO role in 2013,” he said.
Jack Ma said he would work closely with Daniel Zhang, his successor, during the one-year period up to Sept. 10 of next year.
The 46-year-old Daniel Zhang joined Alibaba in August 2007 as the chief financial officer of its online retailing portal Taobao.com and helped this platform realize profit at the end of 2009. In September 2013, he began to serve as Alibaba’s chief operating officer and then became its chief executive officer in May 2015. Under his command, Alibaba saw business growth for 13 consecutive quarters.
Regarding his plans for the future, Jack Ma said in his Monday announcement that he would remain as a partner of Alibaba and continue to contribute to its partnership mechanism, and that he would devote himself to education.
Jack Ma’s planned leave in 2019 coincides with Alibaba’s 20th anniversary and is timed for China’s next Teacher’s Day. Jack Ma, once an English teacher himself, co-founded Alibaba as an e-commerce platform with 17 colleagues in 1999 and had helmed its development over the past 19 years. Today, this company has evolved into a prominent commercial behemoth with businesses in e-commerce, cloud computing, digital media, and entertainment.
