Alibaba Is Replacing Chairman and CEO Daniel Zhang
Alibaba Group Holding is replacing top executive Daniel Zhang by naming company veteran and Brooklyn Nets owner Joe Tsai as the new chairman, as the Chinese e-commerce giant grapples with slow growth and poor stock performance.
The reshuffling at the top, effective on Sept. 10, also comes as Alibaba undergoes a major reorganization. Alibaba is in the process of splitting itself into six independently run companies that could seek separate initial public offerings, a move that would break up the business empire that co-founder Jack Ma had built over two decades.
Eddie Wu, who heads the Taobao and Tmall domestic e-commerce business, will succeed Zhang as chief executive and replace Zhang on the board, the company said in a statement Tuesday.
Tsai—born in Taiwan and a graduate of Yale University—and Wu are both company veterans who have been with Alibaba since 1999 and, together with Ma, helped develop the group’s business strategies and corporate culture.
A decade ago, Wu, who is a less-known co-founder led the company’s strategy to develop and give priority to its smartphone shopping sites as consumers shifted to using the mobile internet.
Zhang is currently heading Alibaba’s cloud-computing unit and will continue to do so, Alibaba said in its statement.
“It is the right time for me to dedicate my full attention and time to the [cloud] business,” Zhang said in a letter to employees that was seen by The Wall Street Journal.
In May, Alibaba said it planned to fully spin off its cloud business and complete its public listing in the next 12 months. It didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment on Zhang’s letter.
Ma, the billionaire co-founder, was recently in Hangzhou, where Alibaba is based. On Saturday, he attended an annual global mathematics competition that he started in 2018 and chatted with the finalists, according to a statement by Alibaba’s research unit.
Ma remains the biggest shareholder of Alibaba and still cares very much about the company, Michael Evans, Alibaba’s president, said at a technology event in Paris last week.
Alibaba has been grappling with sluggish growth, facing a cooling economy and rising competition from homegrown upstarts such as PDD Holding’s Pinduoduo e-commerce platform and ByteDance’s Douyin short-video platform.
In the January-to-March quarter, Alibaba posted the slowest revenue growth for the second straight quarter since it went public in 2014.
Alibaba listed in New York following a blockbuster IPO that remains one of the world’s largest-ever stock sales. Zhang was promoted from chief operating officer to CEO the following year and became the company’s executive chairman in 2019 when Ma stepped down.
Under Zhang, Alibaba was for a time China’s most valuable publicly listed company, with a market capitalization that topped $850 billion at its peak in October 2020. Alibaba was subsequently hit with a record $2.8 billion antitrust fine.
Its shares have lost close to $600 billion in market value from their record high and briefly fell below their New York IPO price last year. Longtime shareholder SoftBank Group of Japan recently unwound its stake in Alibaba.
Alibaba’s Hong Kong-listed shares were 1.6% lower in Tuesday afternoon trading after the company mapped out its leadership succession plan.
Alibaba’s restructuring culminates a yearslong shift inside the company to make it more nimble. Alibaba’s various businesses will be split up into six major areas: cloud computing, Chinese e-commerce, global e-commerce, digital mapping and food delivery, logistics, and media and entertainment.
生词记录
veteran 老手，经验丰富的人；老兵，退伍军人
giant 巨头，大公司
grapple with 扭打，搏斗；努力设法解决，设法对付，尽量克服
stock 库存，存货；股份，股票
reshuffle 改组
undergo 经历，经受
succeed 继任，接替
board 董事会；上船，上飞机
spin sth off 派生出，衍生出；将···分离出来
list 上市
finalist 决赛选手
sluggish 萧条的，迟钝的，行动缓慢的，迟缓的，缺乏活力的，性能欠佳的
upstart 新出现的竞争者；暴发户
post 职位，职务；帖子；公布公司财务结果
go public 公开，公之于众；公开发售股票，上市
blockbuster 轰动，巨型炸弹，轰动一时的书籍/电影
step down 退位
antitrust 反垄断的
unwind 解开，打开，松开；放松，轻松
map sth out 详细安排，筹划
culminate 以···告终，达到···的顶点
nimble 灵活的，敏捷的，机敏的
logistics 后勤，物流工作
