Jack Ma Reportedly to Retire from Alibaba on Monday

Jack Ma

Alibaba co-founder and executive chairman Jack Ma is reportedly stepping down from his position. Ma co-founded the $420 billion e-commerce company Alibaba in 1999. He will officially retire on Monday, his 54th birthday. He expressed his interest to work in educational philanthropy. Ma will remain on the board of Alibaba, but he will dedicate his time to the Jack Ma Foundation and focus on improving the education. A former teacher, Ma told Bloomberg Tv earlier this week he might go back to teaching one day and stated teaching is something much better he can do than being the CEO of Alibaba.

Alibaba is the major e-commerce company ins China and is one of the largest companies in the world. After its establishment in 1999, it has expanded to a wide array of other industries covering movies, new and cloud computing. It has also been trying its hand in the field of artificial intelligence and robotics. Ant Financial, the subsidiary company of Alibaba is China’s largest online payment platform and is valued at $150 billion. Jack Ma has a net worth of $40 billion and is one of the richest people in China. Jack Ma is an influential leader who kept a high profile appearing at many world conferences and speaking to the world leaders. He stepped down as the CEO of the company in 2013. Daniel Zhang replaced him as the CEO.

Jack Ma’s retirement comes at a tumultuous time for the Chinese economy. The United States is having a trade war with China and posed to add tariffs on $200 billion of Chinese goods. The latest round of tariffs is an ongoing trade dispute between the two countries. China is one of the fastest growing economies in the world, but it has started to lose its steam this year and there are more signs of further weakness.

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Steven Burnett
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