By Alibaba announced on Tuesday that it will split into six business groups in one of the most significant overhauls by a leading Chinese technology company to date.
The company’s chairman and CEO, Daniel Zhang, said the restructuring would allow each company to pursue its own fundraising and IPO plans.
Hangzhou-based Alibaba said the moves were aimed at “liberating shareholder value and promoting competitiveness in the market.”
Under the new arrangement, each of the six newly created units will be managed by its own CEO and board of directors. In recent years, the internet giant has faced unprecedented headwinds as Beijing imposed tougher restrictions on the domestic tech industry. According to data from the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology, the total revenue of Chinese internet companies will decrease by just over 1% to 1.46 trillion yuan ($212 billion) in 2022, the first decline. for nearly a decade. Alibaba founder Jack Ma has remained tight-lipped since late 2020 when he delivered a speech against Chinese regulators, followed by Beijing’s shutdown of Ant Group’s planned IPO, an Alibaba subsidiary.
Ma has been spotted around the world over the past two years but rarely appeared in public in China on Monday after falling out of favor.
