Jack Ma was born Ma Yun in Hangzhou, China to traditional musician–storyteller parents in 1964. From a young age, Ma had a penchant for studying English and would ride his pushbike every morning to a hotel near his parents’ house to converse and practise English with foreigners frequenting the hotel. It was one of these visitors who nicknamed him “Jack”. After several unsuccessful attempts to enter university, he finally managed to graduate in 1988 with a Bachelor's degree in English, and he taught English as a lecturer for a few years.
Jack Ma was fascinated with the Internet and while searching for the word “beer” with his friends in the United States, was disappointed to find no information about China. With help from his friends he built a rather crude website which did include information about China and felt that this would connect his country to the rest of the world. He was quoted as saying “the day we got connected to the Web, I invited friends and TV people over to my house” and, on a very slow dial-up connection, “we waited three and a half hours and got half a page … We drank, watched TV and played cards, waiting. But I was so proud. I proved [to my house guests that] the Internet existed.” Ma's “A-ha! moment” was his realisation of the power of the Internet and, mesmerised by its limitless potential, he started a business, China Pages, with his friends, dedicated to creating websites for companies.
Jack Ma's love affair with the Internet continued and he founded Alibaba in his apartment with a group of 18 friends in 1999. His charismatic and visionary style of leadership was able to attract millions of dollars in international venture capital, and he used the funding to improve China's domestic e-commerce market and develop an e-commerce platform for small and medium Chinese enterprises.
Wanting to improve the global e-commerce system, Ma founded Taobao Marketplace, Alipay, AliMama and Lynx. In 2013, Ma's company Alibaba sought an initial public offering (IPO) in the United States after Hong Kong regulators had disagreements with it. Alibaba was the largest IPO in history, raising US$25 billion dollars.
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