Alibaba begins a major restructuring: more transparency, more capital and bet on the metaverse
One of the biggest references in Chinese e-commerce is, without a doubt, Alibaba Group. In order to stay on top, this eCommerce giant has made a series of changes to its internal structure since the end of 2021 and it already glimpses new projects and digital bets for 2023. With these projections, they hope to reverse the poor results of the first half of the fiscal year, when its profits fell 95%.
First of all, Alibaba Group Holding already had the go-ahead from capital increase for its Ant Group division, by the Chinese body responsible for regulating banks and insurers. This will allow the company to continue with its business growth and restructuring planwith special emphasis on the eCommerce area.
Thanks to this decision, Ant’s consumer credit division, set up in June of the year with the permission of the Beijing government, can expand its capital base, which will go from 8,000 to 18,500 million yuan (an estimate of 1,099 to 2,451 million euros). With this economic injection, Ant Group holds 50% of the shares.
Jack Ma relinquishes control of Ant Group in pursuit of transparency
As part of Alibaba’s restructuring process, Jack Mafounder of electronic giant, has ceded control of fintech Ant Group, with the aim of relaxing the pressure that the Chinese regulators and authorities initiated two years ago, after stopping its IPO.
The group had recently announced in a statement a readjustment in the shareholding structure to dilute Ma’s voting power. The purpose of this is to make the techno-financial entity more transparent and diversified, a necessary step to finally go public.
With this movement, Ma ends the shareholder agreement established with Eric Jing (president of Ant), Simon Hu (former CEO) and Jian Fang (a veteran of Alibaba), which granted the tycoon 53.46% of the power of vote of the company, leaving now only the 6.2% of voting rights. According to the statement, the firm wants to ensure that “no shareholder, alone or jointly with other parties, has control over the group.”
Division of the business in national and international
On the other hand, after a restructuring of its board of directors in December 2021, Alibaba grouped its eCommerce business into two divisions: international digital trade and digital trade in China. Now, some news has been announced in this regard.
Among the most recent changes is the Wu Zeming’s appointment, who will occupy the position of CTO of the company, replacing Li Cheng. The latter is not leaving the company, but will occupy the position of technology advisor in parallel to his work as CTO of the group’s local services.
At the same time, daniel zhangChairman and CEO of Alibaba Group, will move to provisionally supervise the Cloud division of the group. Until now, this division was headed by Jeff Zhang, who will now lead the eCommerce research division and simultaneously lead Alibaba’s chip development, T-Head, and IoT projects.
entrance to the metaverse
The metaverse has become a fundamental pillar of development and growth for many companies, and Alibaba is no exception. Hand in hand with Taobao and Diantao, the virtual experience has been developed Tao Live City, whose pilot test was carried out during the Double 11 Shopping Festival in November 2022.
TaoLive City allows users to enter using an avatar, with which they can buy in real time, participate in contests and interact with other users. The virtual experience has eight stages that present a cyberpunk theme.
Although there is no definitive release date, many point to the February 1, 2023coinciding with the celebration of the Chinese New Yeara great shopping event throughout the country.
Another commitment to the metaverse by Alibaba Group is the platform Tmall Luxury Pavilion, already operational, which is based on immersive luxury shopping experiences and designed for a public with greater purchasing power. Within it, users access innovations and digital events in which more than 20 luxury brands participate. This second bet has already started shopping in 3Das well as generating collectible avatars and hosting virtual fashion shows that users can witness through their avatars in the metaverse.
Image: Depositphotos
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