Jack Ma sets the tone for Alibaba's 25-year development

Author | Liu Baodan

Editor | Zhou Zhiyu

On September 10th, the 25th anniversary of Alibaba, Jack Ma expressed gratitude on the intranet, stating that he is proud that the company has had the privilege to participate in promoting social progress, and proud of the Alibaba team's passion, righteousness, and ideals.

Regarding the competitive environment Alibaba faces this year, Jack Ma mentioned that with the resurgence of Internet AI technology, many of Alibaba's businesses are facing challenges and the possibility of being surpassed, which is expected. He believes that only through competition can one become stronger and the industry healthier.

Alibaba's vision is to become a good company that survives for 102 years, and now Alibaba has completed a quarter of that journey. Jack Ma emphasized the importance of not losing oneself under competition and pressure, stating that Alibaba is Alibaba because of its idealistic spirit.

Below is the original speech by Jack Ma (edited):

After reading Jiang Fang's post and the replies from Alibaba employees, I am deeply moved.

Many people ask me, what is the most touching and proud thing about Alibaba for me? 25 years ago, we had nothing but a dream. At that time, the dream seemed very unrealistic. With almost non-existent Internet, payment, and logistics conditions, people only believed in face-to-face transactions and doing business based on "relationships." However, we believed in the future, believed in Internet technology, and believed that through our efforts, we could do something in China and even the world that we could be proud of.

Starting with 18 people, we believed in "ordinary people doing extraordinary things." We hoped to gather a group of people with passion and righteousness to do meaningful things for society. In this era of gratitude, we are thankful to all Alibaba employees who have contributed to Alibaba's dream, thankful to our customers for their trust and tolerance, thankful to investors for their understanding and support, and thankful to all sectors of society for their tolerance. We have transformed ourselves from a company that believes in the future to a company that creates the future.

We aspire to be a company that can survive for 102 years, and every year's experience tells us how challenging this goal is, especially to be a company with ideals and achievements, not just a company that can make money and survive. Over the past 25 years, it seems like we have been struggling, feeling lost, facing setbacks, pain, and struggles, but we have persevered with a smile, advancing and nurturing our ideals.

In 25 years, what I am most proud of is not how many companies we have founded, but how much change and value these companies have brought to society; I am proud not of how much money we have made or how high our market value is, but that even after making money, Alibaba employees still have ideals, passion, and righteousness. I am proud to work with Alibaba employees, to experience, persevere, explore the future, taste failure and lessons together. I am proud that I have had the opportunity to debate, envision, and create the future with so many outstanding young people at Alibaba!

I am proud that without payment, we created payment; without logistics, we participated in logistics; without Internet support technology, we invested in the cloud; where credit was not valuable, we made credit priceless. We believe that technology can and must help every ordinary person, allowing every ordinary person to gain dignity through technology.

What I am even more proud of is that we have had the privilege to participate in promoting social progress, from helping countless young people start businesses and open stores, to Ant Forest, to drug monitoring codes, to using technology to eliminate child trafficking, to solving the issue of train tickets during the Spring Festival, to thousands of programmers working day and night to develop health codes during the epidemic, to many excellent employees who have left their comfortable and familiar work and living environments behind Going to impoverished areas as "rural economic special envoys", Alibaba employees' "chivalry" beyond performance has been recognized.

Today, seeing the resurgence of Internet AI technology, fierce competition in various industries, many of Alibaba's businesses are facing challenges, facing being surpassed, this is expected. Because no company can always stay first in any field, and only through competition can one become stronger, making the industry healthier. Moreover, Alibaba has never been a company protected from competition, Alibaba believes in the power of the market and the value of innovation.

25 years have passed since 1999, we must always remind ourselves not to lose ourselves under competition and pressure. Alibaba is Alibaba because we have an idealistic spirit, we believe in the future, we believe in the market, and we believe that only a kind company that truly creates value for society can persist for 102 years.

I am proud, because I am an Alibaba employee; I am proud that Alibaba employees have created many values beyond business; I am proud because Alibaba employees are compassionate and righteous.

Alibaba, happy 25th anniversary!