Who is Jack Ma?

Who is Jack Ma?

By BBC World Service

Jack Ma is China's best-known entrepreneur, an English teacher who became a billionaire, after he founded the e-commerce giant Alibaba.

However in June 2021, Chinese regulators halted the dual stock market debut of his digital payments company Ant Group - an affiliate of Alibaba - in Hong Kong and Shanghai, citing "major issues" over regulating the company. Mr Ma has been laying low ever since.

In January 2023, it was announced that Mr Ma would give up control of the Chinese fintech giant.

So who is Jack Ma? And what does the future hold now? In November 2022, Business Daily’s Rahul Tandon spoke to Brian Wong, a former Alibaba executive and special assistant to Jack Ma at Alibaba who has recently written a book about his time with the company.

He talks about his relationship with Mr Ma, what he was like to work for, and what he thinks the future could hold.

Producer/presenter: Rahul Tandon

(Photo: Jack Ma, founder of Alibaba Group, speaks during opening ceremony of the 3rd All-China Young Entrepreneurs Summit 2020 in Fuzhou, China. Credit: Lyu Ming/China News Service/Getty Images)

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