Have you ever faced rejection? or found yourself down on luck? Well, then you must have to read this blog. All of you must have heard the name of jack ma, the owner of Alibaba group. He wasn’t born with a gold spoon. But his persistence and hard work take him from rag to riches.
EARLY LIFE
jack ma, the founder of Alibaba, was born in Hangzhou in China in 1964. At that time, China has a communist culture, and poverty has pervasive in the country. His father was a musician storyteller, from which he earns a small amount of money. jack ma has grown up along with his two other siblings.
THIRST FOR LEARNING ENGLISH
At the age of 12, Jack has developed an interest in the English language. So, he takes advantage of the flourishing tourism in his hometown. He begins to visit the nearby parks and hotels and gives tourists a trip around the city in exchange for English lessons. It was then he befriended a foreign tourist who gave him the name “Jack” because it was difficult for her to spell his real name “Ma Yun.”
ACADEMIC LIFE
Jack was not good in studies. Therefore, he failed twice in primary school examinations and thrice in middle school. Though, he managed to finish his high school education.
Subsequently, he applied for the university, but he failed the entrance exam thrice. He even applied to Harvard university almost about ten times, but each time he got rejected. Eventually, he managed to secure a seat in the Hangzhou Teacher’s Institute, which was considered the worst university in the town. However, he started studying to be a high school English teacher.
PROFESSIONAL CAREER
After graduation, Jack applied for jobs in 30 different companies, but he got rejected all the time. When KFC open in China, 24 people applied for the job. All 23 were selected. He was the only individual who got rejected.
He even applied to the police force. Out of 5 applications, he was the only one rejected after being told, “You are no good”.
On account of failing to secure any job in a good company. Jack became frustrated and decided to rely on his English skills. Therefore, he has started to work as an English teacher in a local university.
Later on, he started a translation service business and visited the US as a translator. That was the first time he was introduced to the internet and searched online for a beer. He was amazed to find that almost all significant countries appeared in a search result except China. So he sees the lack of a Chinese website as a business opportunity.
This led him to launch a website named china page, which registers Chinese products and businesses.
jack ma called himself a blind man riding on the back of a blind tiger because he knows nothing about e-commerce and had never touched the computer before.
Ma competed with China telecom company for about a year. Later on, the general manager of the china telecom company offered him a partnership. In order to raise funding, Ma decided to accept their offer. But unfortunately, China telecom acquired five seats, and ma’s company acquired only two. Therefore, they automatically obtained the majority of control of the company. Plus, whatever advice ma’s company suggests, they turned them down. Eventually, he resigned.
THE JOURNEY OF SUCCESS
Subsequently, he gets an offer to join a government job at the Ministry for Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation. Via this job, he was able to develop a connection with influential people.
But he dreamed off to set up his own e-commerce company. In order to start his business, he requires investments. So, he gathered his group of eighteen friends in his apartment and pitched his idea about the online marketplace for small and medium businesses. Eventually, everyone agreed to invest their money. From there, Alibaba has started.
jack ma wants a global company. Therefore, he hand-picked a name that is easy to spell and globally known.
However, the future of Alibaba was still seemed empty. Within the first three years, the company failed to generate any revenue and meet bankruptcy within eighteen months. Plus, ma also confronts internal problems within Alibaba. Due to some disagreement in the team, a few members ended up moving out of the company.
However, Jack has gathered and unified his remaining team and tried to take Alibaba forward. That was the time when eBay has taken complete hold of online business in China. And the biggest challenge for Alibaba was to compete with eBay and replace it. Within five years, jack ma and Alibaba managed to clean sweep eBay from China.
Moreover, the founder of Yahoo, jerry yang help him to raise further fundings. Through this, Alibaba was able to expand into the international market.
In 2014, Alibaba created history by becoming the world’s largest IPO to date. Moreover, the company continued to grow and expand by developing a network of Alibaba groups. This group of businesses offers a variety of services.
Some of the popular subsidiaries of Alibaba group are.
- Alibaba.com
- Taobao Marketplace
- Tmall
- eTao
- Alibaba Cloud Computing
- Juhuasuan
- 1688.com
- AliExpress.com, and
- Alipay.
Because of jak ma’s consistency and hard work, the Alibaba group emerged as the biggest name in the e-commerce world.
His dedication to his work makes him one of the richest men in China. He proves through his action that hard work pays off.
