Jack Ma addresses the Inaugural SA Investment Summit Dinner

and at the South Africa Investment Summit is I can feel that he is a man smile with determination he listened we talked about e-commerce we talked about mobile payment we talked about cloud computing he was so interested he's a jack please come back in two months I would say in two months I fly all the way here come back and Africa is a place there is a big event invest in South Africa you gotta come and he said I go to see you first and then you come back and I say okay I do not know he would go to Beijing join the China Africa conference and it was so busy I know he's very busy he squeezed the time from Beijing to my city for two hours coming he kept his promise and he said Jack now I came you go and there is a alright and we met last month right in the United Nation in the building we were in the United Nation Conference and we met when he was at the elevator gate he said Jack don't forget that so it's a great that give me the opportunity to come back join this a great conference and I said so your president is a man smiles determination he keeps the promise he said come and to keep the promise is any entrepreneurs number-one priority you have if you promise you keep but I got you would know a lot about entrepreneurship if you can just take us through your journey from a teacher to the founder of Alibaba and the lessons that you've learned from that and lessons that entrepreneurs in this room can take from that yeah I was born a normal family I would not say very poor but it's a poor family I I did not study very well I failed exams again again in the primary school middle school and everybody felt you know you are hopeless for and then when I graduated from you high school I tried to join you know to study in the university first year a failed second year a filled and then I started looking for jobs I apply a lot of jobs did not a workout and I tried a third time during the past examination and went to the teacher's college and after four years I hate to be a teacher because no man wants to be teaching in China they think teachers you know so I said now I will really I would have loved looking for jobs in the other field well they all my early days I apply jobs for at least more than 30 times all rejected none of them even got one chance I apply jobs one day for KFC Kentucky Fried Chicken 24 people went 23 people except I was the only guy in five people together classmates we went for a job as a policeman for people accepted I was the only one reject and I apply for a job together with my cousin to work in the hotel as a as a guy in a serve in the hotel my cousin was accepted I was rejected so I came back and my mother look at me say oh so and I told myself my luck has not arrived someday something is waiting for me but not to do and then when I started Alibaba 1994 at the end of the year I got an opportunity to went off I went to USA I discovered internet I think this is something very interesting because if it's a network around the world and this would be something might change the world so I came back to China and I started my company and it was so difficult because China was not even connect to the internet yet 1994 was terrible experience I worked myself I had a giant adventure with the other people and then did not work out for three or four years and then 9 year 1999 I started Alibaba I invited the 18 France most of my students came to my home I made a speech for 2 hours I believe this thing is going to be big in the future ecommerce and everybody said ecommerce in China hopeless because no payment no logistic China internet speed is so slow at that time there's no mobile phones no payment no crack our system there is nothing and I believe it in the future internet is gonna change China if we started and continued to work hard we have the chance so 18 people in my apartment we decided that one day we'll make a company that would be the top 10 companies in the world we gather the money it was so difficult but 90 years we never give up our dream we believe that we should using Internet to help small business while at that time most of the business ecommerce company in America helping big companies we think we should have a small business they think Jack you're crazy small business don't have money how could you help people who don't have money and I say let's help them to make money when they make money we will make money and America at that time they say e commerce should helping people to save the cost I say we should not help his small business to save the cost because small business know how to save the cost they want to know how to make the money so we do the opposite most of the American ecommerce the big company sit customer we say help the small business help them to make the money how to help them make money will help them to sell online a lot of small business they don't have money to go the trade shows they don't have the money to attend all the negotiation or all the big business forums so we say will help them to promote on the Internet that is the way so for 19 years it was so difficult there is no crap no payment would build at the payment there's no logistic that's a beautiful logistic there's no crating system as a beautiful acoustic system and after 90 years we commit today some lots of lessons that can be learned today about a lot of us never give up if you ever dream if you have a dream don't give up a lot of people only talk dreams but they don't make dreams reality a lot of young people have a great ideas in the evening but in the when they wake up they do the same thing the most important is not only dreaming but making sure making the dreams realistic and don't fight don't think anything you do you will succeed tomorrow or next year for people like us we don't have money we don't have a rich uncle or powerful father the only thing we're competing with the others is our vision we believe ten years later this will happen and we get the team started doing that's the way we're going to ask that the arriving Mike's now be handed out among the floor and people who have questions raise their hands so that we can start interacting with the audience but I want to focus on artificial intelligence and the fourth Industrial Revolution and how you think that people in South Africa and the African continent need to start preparing for that and making sure they don't get left far behind well first I think there are a lot of things talking about artificial intelligence and robots and IOT and people Scott start to worry let me tell you don't worry about it young people don't worry when you start to worry you're getting old right don't worry people say artificial intelligence is gonna replace people trust me human beings are always smarter and wiser than the machines the first technology revolution when the train comes people say odd is gonna replace jobs a lot of people hate it but train create more jobs people got disappointed because machine is stronger machine is always going to be stronger than you are that's why we design machines people believe that machine one day will be smart too they're human beings I tell you don't worry about it machine will be smarter than you are computers they never forget they calculate a faster and they never get angry and upset they don't need to sleep so don't worry they're smarter but human beings were wiser machine only have chips human beings have heart so you should have confidence but how people should do it I think very important for any countries let's think about one thing for country if you want to develop there are three basic thing very important the first is education it's always good invest in education and investing education investing people is the best investment in the whole world and second thing is trust and built as support entrepreneurs make entrepreneurs the heroes not making those game clear the heroes we have too sure that it's entrepreneurs that they were using technology education and the top is a transparent efficient government so efficient government entrepreneurs and education for catching the opportunity of IOT artificial intelligence very important is education system the thing I worry about not only China USA the whole world the through the forced technology revolution coming is very scary the first tech tech technology revolution release the power of human beings the machine the second technology revolution released the distance the cars the trains now this technology revolution released the human brain so it's going to be it's a mentally fundamentally change the human lives but the thing the education system the things would teach our kids the way we teach of the kids in the past 200 years for the industry revolution when the digital time came the thing we teach our kids will be replaced by machine machine will do better we have to change the education system have to change the things we teach the kids that they can do better than machines they can be more creative more innovative more constructive that machine can never have a chance to replace them that is something is opportunity for every country and please any country please pay attention to the following pay attention to those people who below 30 years old they are the internet generation please pay attention to those company have less than 330 employees because these are small companies this technology revolution is a big challenge for big companies it's great opportunity for small companies small is going to be beautiful and small is going to be powerful and please pay special attention to the next 30 years next the 30 years is going to be Z BIG's the challenge it's also going to be the best biggest opportunity most people will complain but those people who solve the problems of complaint these people will be successful let those people complain you should solve the problem that's my me on that note I'd like to please take some questions from the floor when you receive your mind can you introduce yourself the company that you're from and in the question that you have for mr. MA we'll start in the front here well thank you MC good evening your excellency all protocol is observed a good evening ladies and gentlemen and thank you mr. Jack mob for gracing this occasion my name is Tanaka Vasily I happen to be a short on the 1873 FM it's an online radio platform and basically the conversations that we have are round building literacy around subjects that matter and one of those subjects happens to be entrepreneurship we often talk about entrepreneurship and being an entrepreneur and we used this with loosely without a shared understanding of what it means to be an entrepreneur and what it means not to be an entrepreneur so the question that I'm posing you to you this evening mr. Jack Ma I just want you to imagine it's midnight and you are asked to look up the African sky and identify three shining stars individuals who who happen to be champions of entrepreneurship literacy in Africa are there any names that come to your mind or they are not and if if not so would you say this darkness as far as this point of light that is young is a young individual who is passionate about entrepreneurship can look up to thank you is they need to identify such individuals who happen to be Bank of hopes for young individuals like myself okay thank you for this very visionary and poetic questions I was I came to Africa Latios my first trip I visit four countries and this year under the four countries I see so many great entrepreneurs here for entrepreneur first the role have the dreams he has to believe the future and entrepreneurs second rows never complain very important they are always optimistic third entrepreneurs always team up with the others nobody can succeed if you don't have a team when I invest a company I will see the entrepreneur the founder he's crazy normally or he looks silly crazy or stupid a lot of entrepreneurs they sounds crazy they sound silly the doing things that noble people don't believe I say entrepreneur we believe we see most people who seeing is believing so look at this guy whether he has good IQ EQ you know if you want be successful you should have a good EQ that is from your heart people with good EQ easy to make friends people give him a chance but people is IQ good IQ they lose very slowly we see a lot of people easier to succeed because people give him opportunity he lose very quickly because you have terrible IQ so when IQ Nika both good these people easy to succeed but if you are if you see where they will be big succeed success that means he needs help you the cue of love he cares for the others he cares for the future so when you have to see the person with IQ EQ and lq you know something interesting and then you see whether there is a group of people surrounding him there is crazy ask him respect him right normally you will find this guy guys and very important this is my way I believe custom number one in pride number to share her number three it's the customer that happy they entire happy shareholder would be happy a lot of American companies they make it shareholder number one this is no good so this is something I would judge an entrepreneur and I when I come to Africa I see so many young people in Africa I found much fewer people complaining today the whole world everywhere any place you go people complaining Africa you see so many young people there any jet they always have a beautiful future they also have a beautiful dreams they also fight I invited close to 70 young entrepreneurs to Hangzhou my cap my hat order and I share with them what we did in the past 19 years ah they all rushed back to Africa with Anik with dreams so I think Africa has it's a it's a continent with entrepreneurs this is why I continue to come I love that we are real engineer a bad and a false fake entrepreneurs we can tell because we are same animals that's why I can see wolf and dog looks alike a wolf knows that is a dog we interpret we know that okay thank you there's some questions at the back if we could please get the mics - they're a reminder please keep your questions short - introduce yourself and let us know what questions you'd like to answer we have a question on the right-hand side of the room at the back lady in red evening Thank You Audrey mature p.c or systemic logic mr. ma most people in this room probably did not know that it took 19 years to get here what would you say to an entrepreneur who's footing right here in year five and feeling like they're giving up what's it what would you say to an entrepreneur who feels like they journey it's taken about five years and they feel like giving up knowing that your journey also took so long yeah the tops the period for any entrepreneur is the first three years congratulation you already passed a three years a lot of people say jack you you and your team made a great there are so many successful stories you have you achieved that much and I said this is what I always shows entrepreneurs as entrepreneur don't learn from those people those successful stories I hate successful stories you should learn from those stories that's mistakes setbacks the other people make spend a time on that because success there are a lot of things there are secret things even the people they don't know what they are things that make them succeed but all the people who fill they have the same mistakes one day there are a lot of books about Alibaba there are a lot of books about me but there is one day I want to write a book Alibaba 1001 mistakes we made so many mistakes but will quickly learn from the mistakes it's so difficult but I know my competitors even worse than I am and I always tell myself if I cannot survive nobody can survive because we work out we believe but of course it's not easy when you become when you decide to be entrepreneur don't be scared of competition don't be scared of failure failure mistakes competition is always follow you and beside you that is the fun part of the business you have to be optimistic when the team are upset you have to multiply them you know motivate them when the team is motivated you should upset them well let everybody believe the future you say well there's a problem where everybody see that a problem you should tell them that's the opportunity and that is the job is the CEO and a founder [Applause] our next question good evening and protocol observed for everyone thank you my name is Gavin Reardon I'm from Kingston Capital we're a venture capital firm vesting in South African startups one of the things that you pointed out so clearly was to make the entrepreneur the hero now what what to top things could you tell us as an audience that we could imply a plot for South Africa and helping to create an entrepreneurial culture that treats the entrepreneur as the hero thank you thank you so much of the the venture capital supporting South Africa because venture capitalists are very important for startups when I started Alibaba we raised five million dollars and later twenty million dollars fortunately or unfortunately even Alibaba let's live for five ten years most of the venture capitalists that invested in us they don't understand our business model they just a believing trust us because as entrepreneur they change a lot because the market to change I remember the first the time I tried to raise money I went to Silicon Valley tried to raise money I was rejected by all venture capital because they want to me giving me said Jack give me a business plan I said I don't have a business plan they say go make one I say I don't know how to make a lie just to think of e-commerce it's a long way they said look at the others they have a such a thick business plan I said sir if I have a thick business plan for you I'm I'm lying I'm cheating you keep changing keep changing keep serving your customer better keep the team motivated that's my plan and I don't know what kind of mistakes all we have so most of the ancient capitalists they love to replace a CEO they say ah this is a terrible company let's check your CEO maybe the home is not a good but if you change your head the whole body dad the day you invest you should have work with them trust them support them even change an arm the arm may not be strong by your change and artificial arm is not that flexible so venture capitalists they are the anchors of the company but the founder is the father a mother of the company uncle should giving the money to buy milk but you should not be the father it should not replace father so this is my advice to venture capitalist and I think to make the entrepreneur's hero those people after thousands or hundreds of mistakes they never give up they succeed they survived they take care of the customers they take care of their employees and they respect the shareholders those people should be the heroes Jack Ma is not a hero people make the me the hero it's not me make the company its we the team make the company its 90 years we don't give up it's these 1001 mistakes that make Alibaba succeed but this what we need a heroes those heroes keeps on doing tough things and never give up that is what I think it's the sprit don't give up be optimistic and have dreams believe the future work with the team and get things down today that's the thing we need we have space for two more questions if we could just be advised who is going to be asking those last two questions we've got someone in the back there hi hi my name is Sheldon I do from pressing investments I wanted to talk to you about the start of your business you're 18 people that you got to join I assume you didn't have enough a lot of capital to incentivize them with money so how did you motivate them to join did you give them a part of your company how much do you keep of your company and how did you find that all right well about the 18th 18 I'm one of the 18 funders most of them were my students and as some of the friends we've been working together since 19 some of them were working together 1995 and they believe that the things that I'm talking about make sense it's not the money that I checked them we start the aching founders were in my apartment I made a speech for two hours we took the video today which sometimes show the video and the video shows the 17 people look at me like a puzzle this guy is crazy I mean but you know what we can't do they're just none of them the 18 founders today they said wow you are genius none of us are genius because we cannot found the Japanese other places so we gather together this is honestly I'm not genius if can you call a person rejected by so many choice genius I'm not a good of schooling I'm not academic and none of us ie team founders were genius but we know if we work together if we study then after my speech we said let's get the money so I said please everybody put your money on the table leave the ten Mouse pay up food money yourself put your money I don't want rule number one don't borrow money for your parents because we may fail if you borrow from a parent's passion I don't want your parents come to me and don't borrow money from friends it's your money so we gathered 50 thousands US dollars from 18 people and I said we hope this money can last for 10 months with Intimus you work hard I try to go to raise money if we cannot raise the money we're looking for job together so we do not know that this $50,000 only lasts for 3-4 months we're all of run on money but a lot of venture capital region us we reject amount that's in capitalist too because we don't think they have the same vision as we we believe so it's not about the money attract those people it's the vision it's the dreams it's the trust we fight a lot with poro a lot we never agree on something for the early days but we get through the fights through the poorest we wish that have good friendships and then we raise the money when we raise the money we start to make mistakes when you have money you start to make where you have a lot of money your capability is not that strong money a lot you were easily to make a lot of mistakes so this is how we did and let me tell you one thing you'll be interested in 2007 where Alibaba b2b IPO in Nasdaq in Hong Kong Stock Exchange we have at least three oh well by the way my my stop percentage is close to fifty sixty percent but my venture caps options to this to the team I'm a believer that you have to grow together share together with the yells colleagues so now my person my ownership of the company like six percent I give all my shares to the people so year 2007 when we IPO we had a like a three three four hundred people become millionaire so we gather together I may I ask them question right everybody now after eight years you all succeed tell me are they because we are hard-working a lot of people are hardworking than we are do you think you're genius or they're smart none of the smart because here 2001-2002 we try to hide people nobody wants to join a company Internet company or a company strange name Alibaba those people if they're not that stupid or disabled they all joined Alibaba is it true and then when we start to go better many headhunting company status to our people those people believe they're smart those smart people all had hunted we people nobody came to hand hadass we think we have to stay this company so after years will become succeed we go through all the tough days now we got our got muscles we got to determine the heart we know only make customer happy will be happy so this is how we develop through tough days it's not we get a lot of talents and then we grow we get people with believing them dreams optimistic we train them hard we work hard we go through the tough days we with tears the cries and smiles we come today I know it's time for a final question Nihao yes now in all protocol observed oh my name is Mei from Accra later one critical issues that in South Africa we have a challenge of the network we have adopted the European standard GSM network most insecure and you know in the battle of cybersecurity is fought in the infrastructure Network what are the possibility for for you to assist the capability of our government provincial local and national around ish for example even the post office have you have all the solution that can help us to do very quick so what are the possibility that true alibaba capability that you have to share and support the capability of our government so that our people will be able to benefit from the city's delivery and in the end in in the in solution intervention the interpreter will also benefit that the key issues because South Africa needs seamless network GSM insecure thank you thank you yeah I think it is very very important for government to be eat government very interesting today mobile phone is everywhere we are entering into a new world that is called digital world data world if all the people received information faster reactive faster received infant infamous fast in the government the government is being troubled and government is normal is the brain of a country if the brain is not equipped by the data technology and all the fingers and feed that equipment that's going to no good this is what I'm trying to convincing all the government in China probably should government please make government to be eat government and I think when you eat government is more efficient you really know because if when you want to serve the people you have to know who are the people what the people need and the data to approve that and I think this is what I had a great discussion with President I think his very enthusiastic and embracing this technology revolution we talked in his home first trip we talked in Hangzhou we talked this afternoon and I think for our company with the technology we have today we have close to 30,000 scientists engineers we developed the technology our mission is empower small business young people women but these days just these years we realized we have to making sure the government are also digitalized because when the government is digitalized they can serve the people better and efficient and cost-effective and I will be very happy to join the force together to improve we have a smart city where we're gonna have a smart government and I'm sure with a determined president and he will lead this country because of all the money I heard today that's great but we need intrapreneurs make the intrapreneurs they can make the money efficiently they can get result done and we also sure that with the equipment's and the data period this government is going to serve the people better thank you so much for your time and your insights and sharing your anecdotes your lessons I know everyone in this room probably got very much out of that or not know that our I'd like to ask president seroma pause that you please come on to the stage give us a few words and like all of us to stand as he comes towards us and addresses us I just let's sit down please let's sit down I think we're all hungry but we've been well fed by what Jack Ma has been saying let's give him a round of applause well it hasn't been said before to me that a guy fell in love with me well let me say it as well jack I also fell in love with you when Jack came to visit me at my home yes I had thought to that it'll just be a five minute visit and it turned out to be a one and a half hour visit and we talked about a whole lot of things and we found that we had a great connection and so I want to thank Jack very very much indeed for the insights that he provides when dr. Hassan al-amin is Uma and I met him she received him and we said he also spoke about something that I thought he would touch on about how they have created this Alipay system a payment platform and how they are able to validate people who who buy and trade on the system and they are able to write whoever participates in the system if you are a good customer and you pay on time you get a rating and you get a top rating all the time when you pay your bills and all that and all that and he then told dr. Ahn causes an alarm in his room and Minister Ibrahim Patel that one of the mutations of this system is now how parents use it when there are suitors who want to marry their daughters they they ask them what is your rating tell us what your rating is and all three of us realized that we've got daughters and when the young men come and wants to to marry our daughters we want to have a system where we asked them for their rating so that we can check so thank you so much jack and also for this IQ system the EQ one the lq one and today i think we can confidently say we also jack have an SI Q system as South Africa Q system and it's wonderful the way that we have seen it evolving here tonight and so that is great and the other thing that I learned is the three e's education entrepreneurship and an inefficient government but what i particularly liked is that we should treat our entrepreneurs as heroes and move away from what we had become fared with and accustomed to here where we treated our entrepreneurs and business people and call them all sorts of names we treated them like enemies and white monopoly capital and all that that must end today we want to make our businesspeople heroes let us see the businesspeople who are here as heroes because they are here to develop and grow our economy I want to end by thanking Jack Ma for having taken all the trouble to come here and I'd like Jack to present you with a truly South Africa made present which I'd like to see you one day on television having in your hand so yeah it's a wonderful bag that is maybe in South Africa well yeah he goes he says he will sell it on Alibaba just as the take away as a take away Jack Ma as I end Alibaba has this system they call it the system's double festival or something a singles day yeah sorry the singles day where they came up with the process where they say people who are single they need to give them a day when they will just shop they must just go shopping because rather than complaining and feeling depressed and said about being single let them go shopping so they have now agreed Alibaba has agreed to put South Africa on that platform on a single day we are now as South Africa going to have a video which I recorded to invite the people who trade on the Alibaba platform the Chinese people mainly and many other people around the world to see a short video that we did on South Africa and inviting people to by South African products and in addition we are going to allow South Africans to trade some products on that singles day so that's going to be phenomenal so we look forward to that and with this our partnership with Alibaba and with Jack Ma then starts is going to finally evolve in the training of young people which they are still considering I have asked him and Jack this is the presidential requests presidential request that we should have here in South Africa a training hub for the young people of South Africa to be as great entrepreneurs as you and your 18 other entrepreneurs who started Alibaba so we think within Jack Ma for coming thank you very much jack we really welcome your being here [Applause] thank you very much thank you [Applause] thank you all for your interaction and your patience the main course I serve now

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Length: 45min 29sec (2729 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 26 2018