Jack Ma on the China Opportunity at Gateway '17

This video for sharing information only, it's not for commercial (non profit). This is of Alibaba Executive Chairman Jack Ma explains why now is the time for U.S. small businesses to enter the China consumer market.

Thank you good morning I was there listening to the wonderful speakers all they tell all the things they talked about reminds me in the past 18 years 18 years ago in my apartment I told the 18 founders that one day we were beautified this side would be the top ten sides of the world and we were beautiful company then can last a hundred and two years and people say why a hundred and two years because our company was born in 1999 last year we had one year this century will finish 100 years and next century we have a 1 year 102 means cross 3 centuries when every go you give to your team should be very accurate if you say ah this company going to last a hundred years nobody take it seriously because every company say we wanted last a hundred years so number you give the team should be very accurate we took the video when I talk to the 18 founders and today when I watch the video a lot of people say well since we don’t have anything to do when you see 102 years of big 10 sides that should do it very few people believe that we will make it happen because we don’t have a high resumes right I graduate from a hundred Teachers College and most of my colleagues and 18 fighters there were my students my friends we are none of them are very successful amount 18 people there are only three people who know something about computer the rest of 15 people know nothing about computer nothing about Internet we had no money 18 people gather fifty thousand dollars and we had a no relationship none of us from rich family or powerful family.

we saw government office background we don’t have a great talent so I told the team that guys if we can be successful 80% of the young people in the world can be successful because at that time China had a note the internet was so backward nobody believed ecommerce in China nobody believed Internet people say China will not develop Internet and China will not have become because you don’t have a credit card system you don’t have logistics you’d have this you don’t have that but I think someday China will have if we started due to now if we prepare for 10 15 years the day that ecommerce in China would woman so that was the arm that was the thinking at the beginning and 30 years ago I was considered I mean in my early 30 years I was considered to be a loser um I remember that you know I apply University for three times all filled and I after you know the first year when I finished University up high school filled in examination for university I went apply for a job in a police station five classmates we went there four of them accepted and I was rejected and one of them one of the folk were rejectedtoday is my chief step he’s been working in the in the in the police for 20 years he's excellent policeman but when we talk about this he always say well the day when we apply for  the being a policeman you’re rejected they feel very proud but they say hey Jack you know you don’t have a chance and the second the thing I remember very well you handled the first of all staff hotel in my city was built my cousin and I waited for two hours in a half in a very hot summer in order to apply job being a hotel waiter after interview my skull was much better than my cousin after interview my cousin was accepted and I was rejected reason is he was taller and more handsome thirty years later today he is still working that Hotel in a round jury room and I changed my life and the other thing is as true twenty four of my friends we went for apply job in a in a KFC and 23 accepted I was the only guy rejected I don’t know why but they say you know I don’t have it so I thought maybe the God said we should do things yourself because I get used to be rejected even to today most of the times when we fill and we do not achieve something I say well get used it we are the people have to learn we get used to be rejected we get used to be the days nobody come to help us support us we should not get used to be successful when we succeed on something we always feel very proud and honored and thankful even June 1999 Joe and I are Sift and vice-chairman and I. 

we took him to Silicon Valley and asked for venture capitalists support we were rejected by more than 30 venture capitalists people even did not want to listen to a talk they say hey you 18 guys none of you guys have a high resumes none of you guys your jewelry is he grabbed it from you but the other 18 guys we don’t have any background and the started way of telling me the top 10 websites want to make a count company lost 102 years and will be duly Commerce in China people say this guys are crazy but we started with a 50,000 US dollars and then I think two years later Harvard came they want to write a case study they spend one week write a loss the case study and talk to me say Jack this is your company I read a case study say no this is not my company this is what we want to do he said this is what this is your company you just did not realize that oh I think okay it is my company and the next six years they put the case study in many universities in Beijing to study that they always put Alibaba and our competitors together every time I was invited sitting at the back of the classroom listen to the people talking about my company for six years every time they say Alibaba would die that competitor will win and six years later all the competitors died with two surviving the reason we do that not because were expert of Internet not because were smarter were not smart people but we are very optimistic we believe in the future we believe in Internet and we believe that if we do not succeed somebody will and we know that.

we have to be humble we have to serve our customers the investors may not like us if the customers like us we have the futures right most of the company died not because they don’t have money because they have too much money and we didn’t have a plan you know I understand a lot of venture capital say Jack what is the business but I said I don’t want a business a plan so how can I give you money if you don’t have business plan and my answer is how can your giving you business plan of internet e-commerce in 1999 the only thing is how can use the internet to support this to support the customers and understand the customers make the customer successful we know only our customers success to succeed we will be successful so this is how we did it and I really am very thankful America 1995 a cuestas fear to discover the internet and year 2001 2002 and the internet or bubble bursted I was happened to be yet again in my home in my friend’s home I watched a wonderful movie called Forrest Gump I liked the sentence it reminds me not every  time when I have a problem I could tell myself this is what Forrest Gump said he said life is like a box of chocolate you never know what you can get and I find the forest God made a fortune by catching shrimps not catching wills so helping small business will make me like a Forrest Gump first come just to keep on running be simple serve the people that was the what I learned and also I think the very important is after so many years.

 I learned I keep on telling myself I want yesterday I told you and today I want to tell you again at the entrepreneur you leave every day is difficult today is very difficult tomorrow it’s much more difficult believing the day up tomorrow that day is a very beautiful that most people die two more evening if you don’t work hard we don’t see the sunshine and people say how could you inspire people when days are so bad we hide people who are very self-motivated don’t hire people who are very sort of complaining as a leader you should never complain if you complain nobody will follow you nobody love to follow a leader who complain a lot and we have to be optimistic I’ve been lucky enough to see to meet so many great business leaders in the world I find all of them they are very optimistic I found all of them never complain and I found all of them want to making sure that their team are better 18 years later now from 18 founders now we got the more than 50,000 people and from my apartment we got a lot of campers today and we have achieved over 550 billion US dollars  sales last year and we also have more than half billion users using our services in China alone and every day more than 200 million people shopping

through a mobile phone on our site and one thing you believe or not I just don't understand there about more than 60 million people browser our-our-our through mobile phone every night we ought to buy anything and we also created more than search more than 33 million jobs this is what with you for China business what with you most products our goal is that we’ve got bigger even crazy with yesterday I told you by year 2036 we tried to build economy that be the world fifth largest economy well our GME last year.

We are ranking number two D 122 in the world in next 2-3 years we want to be the fix in the fifth largest economy we want to support 2 billion consumers we want to create a hundred million jobs for the world we want to support 10 million business be profitable on our platform this is what we want to do and by the way there are a lot of stories about us a lot of books telling about us we know I never write a book by myself because I think when I start to buy my own write my own autobiography that means I’m getting old the book I want to write about one day is about Alibaba 1001 mistakes we made so many mistakes and the mistakes that we learned are the best assets we have ah we made all customers down the only financing on the HR on the marketing and on the competition we have a lot I tell you when story was very interesting its its every startup at the beginning where you want to be global you have the same thing well we started all the above our b2b we want we are helping small business to selling things across the board so we think of turn the where which country has the best technology on the internet we say USA if we are helping international trade international trade you need English which country has a very good English USA and which country has most of the import-export business USA so we say hmmm that means we should put a leave of the headquarter or at least a big office in America so we decided to build up a huge office in San Francisco when we arrived in a San Francisco.

We found something wrong because it is so difficult to high people who know trade in the Silicon Valley San Francisco so we start of high people from a Miami from New York all arriving and to San Francisco after one month two months we realized something wrong when we have like a 30 people in our steppers in Silicon Valley office because those people they know trade but they don’t know anything about the Internet those people who know about Internet they do not do anything about the trade and the other thing frustrated us is that it was a beautiful story at that time because we say China in a day time us is the evening USA in the daytime Chinese are evening so people working they time to send email there so next day they can keep continue work it’s a beautiful story but do not a workout I  find out when later we find out that those people who know trade do not necessary have to know English or at least their English terrible that’s fine people know understand what you are talking about we do not need English experts to do import-export so were know something wrong we say we have to shut down the office and we I told the team the 30 people say were going to shut down you want to get a cash all you want to get Alibaba here if you want to get a cash three thousand dollars like a two or three thousand dollars each person if you want to get a shirt one stents two cents per sure you get options everybody say give me cash no shares.

They all went home happily with $3,000 so we have a lot of mistakes we made a lot of colleagues also made mistakes we survived Alexei we suffer were not successful we will never say alley banana Baba will never say were a successful company because we will not see success until we survive a hundred two years we just to finish 18 years there another 84 years ago the next 84 years anything could happen so we will never see where succeed because every time I think most people here you know at the same feeling when you get a feeling of the successful problem comes right so I hear some of the tips why we survive first we have to believe in the future we have to love the jobs we do we have to love our customers so if you don’t have the vision for the future peep it’s difficult for a team to have a team work do not hire people for you to work hi people to work for the vision you agree on together especially young people my advice if you are 20 years old please join a good company find a good boss to learn how to be how to do business if you are 30 years old try if you want to do something yourself try to do something yourself when you are 40 years old please do something that you are strong at and good at when you’re 50 years old please spend time for the young people giving chance for young people why you’re still strong when you’re 16 years old better spend time with the grandchildren on the beaches this is generally speaking and this is something that everything you do you have to love it if you do not like the things you  know you’re doing you are soaked I mean you’re live facing trouble right sec is that try to build a good team what is a good team name the good team does not make you high excellent of people from Harvard or from a multinational five hot watching five fortune 500 countries or companies I remember when we raised the five first to five million US dollars we think ha now we have money from fifty thousand dollars to five million dollars so we should hide great people we hide close to ten excellent the vice presidents for a many multinational companies one of the guys who are the marketing expert vice-president of a big company he gives me a business plan a marketing plan twelve million US dollars and I say hey we only have five million dollars how could you give me a business plan for two you know for next year’s budget to marketing twelve minutes its a jack I never make any plan below twenty million dollars hide the right people not necessary the best people the best people is always you train them not there’s no best people in the market the best people is out for you is always you train yourself so as I say if you’re high the people who are very good not suitable to you it’s just like you are putting a boy seven four seven engine into a poor tractors neither of them are happy the Boeing set the engine is not happy the project is not happy so find the right people and the other thing.

 I want to say is that making sure that you focus on the product and services your vision designs what kind of people are joining you but what kind of people joining you with decide the product and services as the Chairman as the CEO at the founder of the company you have to be sure your customer are happy with the program service I know nothing about it I hate high-technology because people like me when were here by the high technology we are scared but when we want to get a government support with our government we are high technology but when we tell the consumers users say this is so simple so I was for the first two years I was the product tester of Alibaba website because I know 80% of the people in the world of on the business world like me we just want to

have a dump click get what I want so many of the times when the engineers designed some wonderful software’s they feel excited and I would test it if I cannot use it just to throw into the rubbish if I can use it I believe 80% of people can use it so this is this is what I think is input the fourth important for start-up remember always customer number one employees number two shareholder number three if you put its the customer pay you the money it’s the employees that their creation they’re innovating make the customer happy I believe if the customer happy in price happy the shareholders will be happy I don’t like Wall Street put the cups put the shareholder number one where shareholder put number one people start to cheat number five as the startup please stay focused I find a lot of startups they want there are so many dreams they change it dreams every day if there are nine rabbits on the ground if you want to catch one rabbit don’t change the rabbit change yourself right remember that nine rabbits you have to stick to one rabbit and cute that rabbit you got it don’t change the rabbit all the time you will get nothing so embrace the change and change yourselves well the sex the next thing I want to share with you want to tell you about the world is has changed the world is changing there be very fast don’t complain about a chance because your complain it changed you don’t complain the changes and when I was young I don’t like a Bill Gates I don’t like Microsoft I don’t like the Oracle because I think these guys taking all of my jobs taking all of my opportunities when you are tiny young you want to compare yourself to Bill Gates Larry Ellison you will be very disappointed it’s better for you to compare to your neighbors how can you learn from them why barber wash yeah.

 I went to Detroit past two days I found a lot of barber shops here I don’t know what where you have open a barber shop you have the check why mgr. wall shop better than Toms there must be things inside you have to learn where is the opportunity always exists in the place where people complain if you can solve the complaining problems that is the best opportunity the world has changed I say we are in a very  critical period of technology revolution every technology revolution the first 50 years are critical the first technology revolution the first 250 years are very important about the first 250 years the first 20 years are the technology next 30 years about application of the technology so in the first technology revolution if yet if you are the first company using the steam machines you’ll be successful the second technology revolution is year the company using electricity sooner faster and quicker than you will be successful this technology revolution if you are the company embrace the change see the future change yourself you might have a better chance so why I say the world is dangerous I say the first attack knowledge caused world war one second technology revolution caused to world war ii now we are entering the third technology revolution its going to be tough if we do not fight against the same enemy poverty disease environment the what the human being is going to be big trouble so we have to be sure we have to understand the future and the other thing is that I want to say people don’t like globalization I am a strong believer of globalization.

 I’m a strong believer of  free trade the past 20 years globalization was designed for big companies in 200 years ago globalization was controlled by few emperors and kings in the past 20 years globalization was controlled and manipulated by sixty thousand big companies young people had no chance small business and no chance women had a no chance developing countries had a no chance so but even that past 20 years the world economy grow very fast because of globalization what if we can support six minutes 60 minutes more business they can go global they can buy and sell that thing will change very  fast so I think whether things is changing so fast everybody here every other jump you have to think about this what does this change mean to me to my kids what should I change myself to meet the changes what kind of things I should do about it.

So I recommend to many government offices and I also would love to share this idea with many entrepreneurs here remember pay special attention to next 30 years in the past 20 years we have a Google we have Amazon with a Facebook of Alibaba with all the exits that   all the companies but the next 30 years those pure Internet company will win that’s the city years adult company who can make use of the Internet using Internet so well those companies will win so please pay special attention to the next 30 years please pay special attention to those people what below 30 years old today they’re about 1.7 billion people in the world using Internet and most of those people are below 30 years those people who are below 30 years old they are the internet generation they are the generation going to change the future please pay attention  to those companies who have less than 30 employees because small companies will be the future and small companies will be the companies of 21st century I’m a strong believer of that because in the past 100 years industry period everything is about amount size standardizations next 30 years the world is shifting from standardization to personalization’s so big companies is going to face huge challenges small guys we have a problems but these big fat guys they have a big problems that we have and if you want to be a successful people an entrepreneur remember you need IQ EQ and l Q what is l Q  is Q of love if you want to be successful you should have EQ this way of EQ you know how to deal with people but if you do not want to Phil you should have the IQ  may not be used your team I’m not a guy that have high IQ but my team do have very high Q when we have a lot of a high IQ guys they need a people like me with good EQ things and I help you the pure of love is about a care for others where you care for others last century the IT in able yourself this century the DT the data time vapor technology is to enable the others so when you pay special attention to Nexus it ears people who are below thirty years old company below thirty people please also pay special attention to women women care for the other people much more than men care for themselves more than women’s one of the secret sauce for Alibaba is that we have more than 48 percent of the men of the people in the company.