We all have heard of Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Mark Zuckerberg, and Jeff Bezos who lead the list of billionaires. One of them is Jack Ma Yun, a Chinese billionaire who was at one point in time in their life, couldn’t even afford a job!
Jack Ma Yun or Jack Ma, as we popularly call him, was born on 10th September 1964, in Hangzhou, Zhejiang, China. Unlike many rich people, he struggled in his childhood. Ma was born in a family that had to struggle for basic means. The only luck he had was that he was born into a happy family. His parents were musicians who also narrated stories to earn a living. He had to learn English by conversing with tourists at the Hangzhou International Hotel.
It was during one such moment when he became a friend of a foreign tourist who called him by the name ‘Jack’, as he found Ma’s Chinese name difficult to pronounce. Ma used to ride 27 kilometres (17 miles) on his bicycle to guide the tourists and to practice English as well. In the 21st century, where people can easily learn English anywhere, Jack Ma had to suffer a lot during the 1960s and 70s, for the same!
Jack Ma had to suffer even more in his later youth when he failed the entrance exam for the Hangzhou Teachers College twice. Usually, many people are good at Mathematics, but Ma was not one of them. He failed because his weak point was Mathematics. It took him three years to pass the entrance exam which was held annually.
The good quality in him was to not give up. He had all the 3 D’s incorporated in him: Dedication, Devotion and Determination. Jack Ma graduated in 1988 with a Bachelor of Arts in English. He became an English and International Trade teacher at Hangzhou Dianzi University. Jack Ma married Zhang Ying, a fellow student after his graduation who would later be active in Ma’s business and remain its general manager till 2004. They have a son, Ma Yuankun (also called Jerry Ma), Ma Yuanbao and another girl.
In various speeches, Jack Ma has revealed his failures and incidents in life when he was rejected by everyone. These incidents can inspire us to face challenges with might. Some of them are:
Ma had applied ten times to Harvard Business School, which rejected him each time.
While graduating from Hangzhou Normal University, he applied for 31 different odd jobs and was rejected by everyone.
Ma had also applied at a KFC restaurant when it came to his city. Twenty-four people had applied for the job. Twenty-three were accepted while Ma was the only one rejected!
In 1994, Ma started his first company, Hangzhou Translation Agency. In 1995, he went to the US where he was introduced to the internet by his colleagues. Ma had tried to search for general information about China but could not find anything.
He and his friends created a website about China and started receiving emails from Chinese investors who wished to know about him. It was then that Ma realized that the internet had a lot to offer. In April, of the same year, he and his computer teacher opened the first office for China Pages and Ma started his second company. On 10th May 1995, they registered the domain chinapages.com in the US. In just three years, the company made 5,000,000 Renminbi which was equal to the US $800,000 at that time! Ma has rightly said:
“We are never in lack of money. We lack people with dreams, who can die for those dreams.”
This was the opportunity Ma had been waiting for. He, with the help of his friends soon began developing websites for Chinese companies. From 1998 to 99, he was the head of an IT company set up by China International Electronic Commerce Centre, a department of the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation.
However, in 1999 itself, he quit and returned to his home town with his team to find, what we call today ‘ALIBABA’. He along with 17 friends started a new venture in the field of Marketing with 500,000 yuan. Ma had started Alibaba in a small apartment in the US which he owns to date because he wants Alibaba to remember where the company began and to never forget its dream of helping small businesses. About his friends, Ma has said:
“You need the right people with you, not the best one.”
The name ‘ALIBABA’ was given by Jack Ma, as he knew about the story of ‘Alibaba and The Forty Thieves. The Alibaba Group consists of multiple e-commerce platforms that allow companies within China to more easily to sell to each other.
Unlike his past, Jack Ma’s company came out with all guns blazing! Within four months, Alibaba won a $25 million foreign venture capital investment from Goldman Sachs and Softbank. The program aimed at improving the conditions of small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs). Alibaba had become profitable by 2002.
Ma aimed to improve the global e-commerce system and for the same, he founded the Taobao Marketplace, Alipay, Ali Mama and Lynx in 2003. Taobao had an excellent beginning with eBay offering to purchase the company. However, Ma rejected the offer and instead gathered support from Yahoo co-founder Jerry Yang, who invested $1 billion!
In September 2014, Alibaba had raised over $25 billion in an initial public offering (IPO) on the New York Stock Exchange. Alibaba had become the most valuable technology company in the world after raising $25 billion which was the largest in USA’s financial history! Who had thought that a person who was rejected by so many brands, would himself become a brand one day! On 9th January 2017, Ma met Donald Trump, the then US President to plan out 1 million job opportunities in the coming 5 years through Alibaba’s business interests in the US.
For his works, Ma has also received countless awards, viz:
In 2004, Ma was honoured as one of the “Top 10 Economic Personalities of the Year” by China Central Television (CCTV).
In September 2005, the World Economic Forum selected Ma as a “Young Global Leader”.
In May 2009, Time magazine listed Ma as one of the world’s 100 most powerful people.
In 2014, he was ranked as the 30th-most-powerful person in the world in an annual ranking published by Forbes.
In 2017, Fortune ranked Ma second on its World’s 50 Greatest Leaders list.
In May 2019, Ma and other 16 influential global figures were appointed by the Secretary-General of the United Nations as the new advocates for sustainable development goals.
In July 2020, Ma received from King Abdullah II a first-class medal for his contribution to fighting back against the COVID-19 pandemic.
Ma was also good at acting. He had been a part of “Can You Feel The Love Tonight” in 2009, during Alibaba’s birth anniversary. On 8th September 2017, which was Alibaba’s 18th year of establishment, Jack Ma appeared on stage and gave a performance that was inspired by Michael Jackson. In the same year, he also made his acting debut in a kung fu short film, Gong Shou Dao. He also participated in a singing festival.
In 2018, it was time for Ma to step down as the executive chairman of Alibaba. There were rumours and speculations that he had stepped down due to pressure from the Chinese Government, although Ma denied it by saying that he wanted to spend time on the welfare of the people. Two years later, i.e., on 1st October 2020, Ma officially stepped down from the board of Alibaba.
Jack Ma has a net worth of $48.4 Billion in 2021 according to Forbes and is currently ranked 26th on the list of billionaires and 5th on the list of Chinese Billionaires. His best ranking on the world list has been 17 in 2020 and on the Chinese list, his best ranking was 1st in 2019 and 2020.
Although Ma stepped down from Alibaba, his job was not complete yet. He indulged in philanthropy. He founded the Jack Ma Foundation. In 2008, Alibaba donated $808,000 to the victims of the Sichuan earthquake. In 2015, Alibaba launched a non-profit organization, ‘The Alibaba Hong Kong Young Entrepreneurs Foundation’ which funded the reconstruction of 1000 houses that were destroyed due by an earthquake in Nepal. For his contributions, Forbes awarded him with the ‘Malcolm S. Forbes Lifetime Achievement Award’. His foundation also donated money, surgical masks, ventilators and other medical equipment to fight Covid-19.
It is quite apt to say that no one had ever thought a person, who struggled to even learn English would one day launch a website and help various countries and their small businesses to develop. He is truly an inspiration for the youth! I would like to mention an excellent quote by Jack Ma:
“Today is hard, tomorrow will be worse, but the day after tomorrow will be sunshine.”
A nice article 👍
Just in one article you have conveyed his life story perfectly. Keep writing ✍✨…….😊