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Tuesday, September
11, 2018 09.19AM / FA
Jack Ma Yun, founder and chairman of Chinese e-commerce empire Alibaba Group Holding, on Monday announced plans to step aside a year from now. In a letter, Ma said he would make way for CEO Daniel Zhang, and would work with him over the coming 12 months to ensure a smooth transition.
Below is the full text of Ma's
letter:
Dear Alibaba customers, Aliren, and
shareholders,
Today,
as we mark the 19th anniversary of Alibaba, I am excited to share some news
with you: with the approval of our board of directors, one year from today on
September 10, 2019 which also falls on Alibaba's 20th anniversary, Group CEO
Daniel Zhang will succeed me as chairman of the board of Alibaba Group. While
remaining as executive chairman in the next 12 months, I will work closely with
Daniel to ensure a smooth and successful transition.
Thereafter,
I will stay on the Alibaba board of directors until our annual shareholders
meeting in 2020.
I
have put a lot of thought and preparation into this succession plan for ten
years. I am delighted to announce the plan today thanks to the support of the
Alibaba Partnership and our board of directors. I also want to offer special
thanks to all Alibaba colleagues and your families, because your trust, support
and our joint enterprise over the past 19 years have prepared us for this day
with confidence and strength.
This
transition demonstrates that Alibaba has stepped up to the next level of
corporate governance from a company that relies on individuals, to one built on
systems of organizational excellence and a culture of talent development.
When
Alibaba was founded in 1999, our goal was to build a company that could make
China and the world proud and one that could cross three centuries to last 102
years. However, we all knew that no one could stay with the company for 102
years. A sustainable Alibaba would have to be built on sound governance,
culture-centric philosophy, and consistency in developing talent. No company
can rely solely on its founders. Of all people, I should know that. Because of
physical limits on one's ability and energy, no one can shoulder the
responsibilities of chairman and CEO forever.
We
asked ourselves this question 10 years ago - how could Alibaba achieve
sustainable growth after Jack Ma leaves the company? We believed the only way
to solve the problem of corporate leadership succession was to develop a system
of governance based on a unique culture and mechanisms for developing
consistent talent and successors. For the last 10 years, we kept working on
these ingredients.
Having been trained as a teacher, I feel
extremely proud of what I have achieved. Teachers always want their students to
exceed them, so the responsible thing to do for me and the company to do is to
let younger, more talented people take over in leadership roles so that they
inherit our mission "to make it easy to do business anywhere."
Carrying out this mission in order to help small businesses, young people and
women around the world is my passion. This is not only our intent from day one
but I feel blessed to have this opportunity. To realize the dream behind this
mission requires participation by a lot more people than just Jack Ma and
persistent effort by generations of Aliren.
Alibaba
is amazing not because of our business or scale or accomplishments. The best
thing about Alibaba is that we come together under a common mission and vision.
Our partnership system, unique culture and talented team have laid a strong
foundation for the legacy of our company. In fact, since I handed over the
CEO's responsibilities in 2013, the company has run smoothly for five years on
the back of these institutional ingredients.
The
partnership system we developed is a creative solution to good governance and
sustainability, as it overcomes several challenges faced by companies of scale:
continuous innovation, leadership succession, accountability and cultural
continuity. Over the years, in iterating our management model, we have
experimented with and improved on the right balance between systems and
individuals. Simply relying on individuals or blindly following a system will
not solve our problems. To achieve long-term sustainable growth, you need the
right balance among system, people and culture. I have full confidence that our
partnership system and efforts to safeguard our culture will in time win over
the love and support from customers, employees and shareholders.
Since
the founding of the company in 1999, we have been of the view that Alibaba's
future will need to depend on "droves of talent" to enable us to
iterate on our management succession plans. After years of hard work, today's
Alibaba has a world-class talent pool in quality and quantity. The teacher in
me feels extremely proud of our team, our leadership and our unique
mission-driven culture, as well as the fact that we continue to develop
exceptional business leaders and professional talent like Daniel Zhang.
Daniel
has been with Alibaba Group for 11 years. Since he took over as CEO, he has
demonstrated his superb talent, business acumen and determined leadership.
Under his stewardship, Alibaba has seen consistent and sustainable growth for
13 consecutive quarters. His analytical mind is unparalleled, he holds dear our
mission and vision, he embraces responsibility with passion, and he has the
guts to innovate and test creative business models. Deservedly, China's
business news media has named him the No. 1 CEO in 2018.
For
these reasons, he and his team have won the trust and support of customers,
employees and shareholders. Starting the process of passing the Alibaba torch
to Daniel and his team is the right decision at the right time, because I know
from working with them that they are ready, and I have complete confidence in
our next generation of leaders.
As
for myself, I still have lots of dreams to pursue. Those who know me know that
I do not like to sit idle. I plan on continuing my role as the founding partner
in the Alibaba Partnership and contribute to the work of the partnership. I
also want to return to education, which excites me with so much blessing
because this is what I love to do. The world is big, and I am still young, so I
want to try new things - because what if new dreams can be realized?!
The
one thing I can promise everyone is this: Alibaba was never about Jack Ma, but
Jack Ma will forever belong to Alibaba.
Jack
Ma
September
10, 2018
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