Jack Ma or Ma Yun (created October 15, 1964) is a Chinese entrepreneur. He’s Executive Chairman of Alibaba Group, a family of highly successful Internet-based companies. He’s the very first mainland Chinese entrepreneur to show up on the cover of “Forbes”.
In 1995, Ma founded China Yellowpages, broadly considered to be China’s first Internet-based business. From 1998 to 1999, Ma headed an information technology firm created by the China International Electronic Commerce Center, a section of the Ministry of Foreign Trade and Economic Cooperation. He founded Alibaba.com in 1999, a China-based business to business market website which now serves more than 79 million members from more than 240 countries and territories. In November 2012, Alibaba’s online transaction volume exceeded one trillion yuan. Ma was therefore labeled “trillion Hou”, meaning literally “Trillion Yuan Marquis” in Chinese. January 15, 2013, Jack Ma issued an open letter to workers saying his intent to retire from his post as CEO of Alibaba Group by May 10, 2013. He became a trustee of The Nature Conservancy’s China plan in 2009 and joined its international board of directors in April 2010.