Jack Ma: You're Supposed to Spend Money on Your People

it is my privilege to be here this evening with Jack Ma one of the great entrepreneurs of our time of course the founder of Alibaba and we have so many things to talk about over the next half an hour and of course we also want to try to get to your questions as well we're going to talk about Alibaba of course but also China the Trump world but we all live in globalization and trade and and so many other issues but first of all thank you I'm from silver mining us let me start with this which is to say that you just spent some time inside Trump Tower in and when to go visit with Donald yeah our president-elect in the United States tell us about that meeting what's very productive meeting much better than I thought that I'd expected what did you expect well I heard a lot and a watch like everybody i watch all the news and heard a lot about him so when I go inside a South mm anything that but he's very sort of open minded listened what I talk so I think I'm a very happy about results and filed when he he said he also said Jack let me walk you down so I think he's very happy by the results we had can I ask how did a meeting like that happen do you call him did she call you how does this take place well that's that's the question I'm asking myself because some some day I got some requests from people say Jack do you want the meeting the present elect I say is that true enough cuz I'm not ready for that because I don't know what to talk about and then few days later I got another request I got a several requests and then I saw one email which were branches very sort of specific outside I thought about it I think yes maybe I should go and have a talk and at least I think presently left on the Trump would be happy to hear what I want to talk about so I went and what did you tell him about the small business talk about agriculture products talk about the trade between China and the USA we especially focus on Todd telling about how can we bring this small business in America sell them to China to age it through our network which can create a lot of jobs for them and you committed to create what you says we're going to be 1 million jobs in the United States yeah over in exile years yeah now that's not a million jobs that Alibaba itself but you're not hiring a million female no we are all totally Alibaba employee put together it's like a 45,000 people we cannot hire one man I cannot imagine I can manage 1 million people now explain to us how you think about the us-china relationship given some of the comments that Donald Trump has made about China being a manipulative manipulated that come up during your meeting well I think first in America there's a freedom of speech right so he can say whatever you want and I respect I understand but of course I have my views we did not the debate about the China you as a trade or manipulation with in a debate with another we actually agreed on something small business developed in the Middle West America helping the farmers there's small business there too exporting to China so we all agree but something that we do not discuss about the you know the American did job losing the China and Mexico and this can I share with you my ideas please yeah first I think 30 years ago when i justá-- graduate from universities I heard America and a wonderful strategy they all souls the manufactured job service jobs they also the manufacturers to Mexico and China also the service job to Indian there's a book of called the world is flat Tom Friedman yeah alig at the New York Times and I think the strategy now that the American said we just want to conclude the IP we just want to technology we just want a brand to leave the law and a job for the world grace strategy and second is that the American international companies made millions millions of dollars from globalization the top 10 top 100 companies in America amazing I remember when I graduate from university I try to buy a deeper the Motorola beeper cost me $250 my pay at that time is at $10 a month as a teacher and the cost of making that beeper is only $80 for a chip so past two thirty years IBM Cisco Microsoft they made a ton of moment the money the profited made a much more than the four largest banks in China put together the moat China Mumbai from China Unicom in or whatever you name it put together still these multinational companies made more money best so the market cap grow more than 100 times in past 30 years but where's the money go this is what I would cure to get some business people I always care about the balance of where is the money coming when money go past the 30 years the American had 13 wars spending 14 point two trillion dollars the money going there what if there's been a part of them money on building up the infrastructure helping the white cause the white collars and blue collars no matter how strategy good it is you're supposed to spend money on your own people right Aldi not everybody can pass Harvard like me we gotta main our current education right we should spend money on those people who are not a good at schooling and the other money which I curious about is that when I was young I heard America's better fold fold and Boeing those big manufactured companies last two years I heard about it Silicon Valley and Wall Street the money go to the Wall Street and what happened year 2008 the financial crisis why put out nineteen point two trillion dollars usal off then why put all of the white colors and destroyed thirty four million jobs globally so what is the money not a wall strip what if the money spent on a Middle East Middle West of the United States developing the industry there that could be change a lot so it's not the other countries still jobs from you guys it is your strategy okay but you do not distribute the money that the money and things in a proper way this is what I and now we are having a backlash and that backlash is a rebuke of globalization and so much of the conversation frankly that we have here and that backlash is happening in the United States but I will say President Xi was here yesterday you had once with him and he was quoting Abraham Lincoln what did you make of that well I would say that globalization is a great stuff it's the USA's developer countries of teach us how to do globalization I remember 2002 or one would people trying to join the WTO everybody in China was worried me I was worried because what if all the international products come to China destroy our industry and we have lose a job so you convince the China after 20 years then you guys are telling say this is a terrible thing I believe globalization is good but globalization needs to be improved this is Donald Trump presently liked want to solve it the problems that globalization I think should be inclusive globalization in the past of 30 years the globalization was controlled by 60,000 big companies a hundred years ago globalization was controlled by several kings and Empress what if next to 30 years we can support 6 million business doing this cross book what if in next 30 years we can help support 20 minute small business can do business across the board so this is something which I believe globalization should be inclusive and do you think that the words President Xi will happen in reality which is to say now that China has largely acted on its own behalf for many many years and now is effectively saying that the US needs to continue acting on to everybody else's perhaps yeah I think you know the world to need some outside being such a mr. Xie yesterday it's a wonderful time at the best time or the worst time the world need a new leadership but the new leadership is about working together this is what I understand we do not necessarily need one specific leader to teach us what to do what not to do but the world have to partner together this is what I think and I think I like at the Chinese as a business people I like I feel proud for what President Xi said yesterday as a business person I want the world to share the prosperity together to join the post together as a Chinese I'm happy about what he committed yesterday he said you know he speaks like us take the responsibility of the second largest economy at the China's second largest economy he has to take some responsibility this is the first time I heard a Chinese leader like number commitment he said next 10 years we are going to import 800 US dollars this if you live you make me feel excited because China is transforming from exporting to importing if there's a concrete number if we can secure it this going to be a huge change to the China and to the wall which I think it's easier today for China to be interested in globalization it the benefits that accrue that can accrue to China because you're continuing to develop than it is for countries that are quote unquote developed well first the WTO rule is not decided by China it's not light by China I will say there's something that I want to change the WTO is designed a lot lower route design for big companies in parts of the years and only big companies can do it and China definitely manage a lot from opening I think China shall learn one thing that we grow in the past of the years it's because we open to the world it will continue to open not always not fully American business that wants to affect we go into business in China has a very difficult time has to partner effectively with a company that's there already this is why I said China has the problems too the world has problem and China has definitely a lot of problems China should open we should have been brought confidence this is what I feel yesterday after the confidence of mr. XI that he is ready to open more to the trip to the world this is what I suggest that we should solve the problem by business community and by negotiation WTO China joined WTO for foot forward 20 years or 70 years I have done the number but the past years that I think we as a business we as a country with the world we have to review something right but not because imbalance the things we stopped it you've been calling for something called ewt P yeah what is that this is what I would talk about is that the WTO was great but they mainly designed for developed countries big companies there's no opportunity for small business we want to build up a double electric world trade platform to support young people small business thanks through mobile phones internet they can sell by cross the board and the other thing is that W is is a very interesting organization when you put the door we put two hundred government offices in a world I ask them to agree on something it's impossible I can never imagine that they can agree on something together business should be designed about business people so we believe II W TP should be something that the business people sit down together agree on something negotiate or something and get endorsement from the government or talk a little bit about Alibaba and the model itself because I think for many in the West if you will they don't necessarily understand it and to the extent and height in Italy that the extent that I could try to compare it to Amazon which I know you think is an unfair comparison one of the things that's so fascinating to me is that Amazon and Jeff Bezos have pursued what might be described as a very asset heavy business model they're buying airplanes they want to own the entire supply chain from beginning to end and Alibaba has effectively an asset like this it is very much in terms of the retail piece of this the opposite you don't want to own the warehouses you don't want to own the logistics company how do you think about that is Jeff Bezos right or you right and is there is there going to be a meeting in the middle I hope both are right and because the world can never have a one bottle if the world has only one correct a model there was too boring but we need to have all kinds of models and the people who did the bottle should believe in the model and I believe what I do right the difference between Amazon and us Amazon is more like an empire everything they should control themselves buy and sell and our philosophy is that we want a bigger ecosystem our philosophy is to empower others to sell empower others to fit to service empower making sure the other people are more powerful than us making sure with our technology our innovation our partners our tendering small business sellers they can compete with Microsoft IBM our philosophy is that we we think using internet technology we can make every company become a mature remember working today for ourselves our gme last a year is more than 550 billion US dollars - hi people deliver for us we need a 5 million people so how can we high-five minute people deliver things for us to deliver the things we thought the only way we do is empower the service company no just companies making sure they are efficient making sure that they make the money I'm making sure that they can hire more people without owning the whole chain can you do it as effectively the idea that you're having watching Amazon being able to deliver things now within hours literally we made a hundred twenty five cities deliver within one day last year imagine 10 years ago deliver one thing from Beijing to hounds or ticks by the 80 days now you can deliver things from a hunk from Beijing to in the mongolian city within 12 hours it's improving you can never expect these things happen within 24 hours we have patience so I think can you imagine that we doing the 1111 singers day we sold 17 billion trillion billion dollars and by delivering more than 600 million packages within three days this is happening and this is what we feel proud of it's not how much money we make is not how powerful we are we think because of the technology we can make the technology very inclusive that every small companies can use it this is my dream because I start my first business 1992 in China that's a small business in order to borrow money five thousand US dollars from bank took me three months to acquire still fail so difficult to be a small business today with the technology we can empower them this is something I want to do one of the critiques as you know and it continues to linger around Alibaba is the piracy issue this is a not there's an IP you all over China but it you you take the brunt of a lot of it now how much progress have you made in your mind and how do you think about some of the regulatory bodies and other countries including the US that continue to criticize Alibaba for this issue first when we started this business as a business like this size you have to take all the criticism you have to listen what is right what is wrong and the second is an ecommerce when you put 10 minutes small business empower them to sell we do not like Emma to buy we cannot even you buy when you buy 55 trillion dollars of 55 550 billion dollars you cannot check every products so the model itself and the e-commerce itself may have a lot of this frost and third I would say in the past 17 years we are the leader of this empty privacy this is the IP protect IP but the second we are Internet companies we do not have the law enforcement we find this guy is selling product and cheaper you know fake products with delete them we cannot arrest them but we are huge progress last year alone we put 400 people into juice we delete a 370 million great product listing on our site I want to say we are the leaders and we are using the big data to check who's buying who's manufacturing who's selling what is address so now I'm happy about the whole world especially China all the government organization start to realize the issues so I would tell you good thing is that today when you go to those criminal group which I call them criminals those fake products manufacturers sellers you praised the quality though of some of these I would talk about later right those criminals that they can go anywhere not help on FEMA because using our data we trace where they are who they are what's address what they map I will deliver this to the PlayStation and working with them the rest the quality issues is something I want to share with people it's not about praising the fake products I want to say that for so many years those branded companies you have to be very careful because the fake products their quality improving is scary that is the difference between us because when you find guys the thing that people said this is fake and you have to find people you have got a third-party institution to check it it's a fake or not we find sometimes the quality is better and I tell you another thing even scary a lot of there's a one brand company he said we are selling fake products we check everything it's nothing wrong so sir hmm what is wrong we buy the product from his flagship and delivered to them this is a fake you know a thing we buy shop buy things from the Flex shop of this brand and deliver back it's the fake products they say so it's a bit confusing this is fighting against the fake product is a war against the greedy humans greediness it's not easy you cannot have finish it but you have to continue to fight and I want to say we put 2 thousand people 1 billion I beat every year fighting our ganbatte it can never finish the wall within 2 years but I'm happy whether people criticize me criticize us the most important is that we are happy about the progress we made but if people praise me so you know when people say Jack you're wonderful I know I'm not wonderful write all about the great we are not great we're just a 17 year old company but when people say you're doing nothing no we're doing a lot of things we have to argue you're at the debate you do what you believe one of the things you mentioned was using big data on the piracy side but the other thing that you using a lot of that big data to do is provide credit yeah and effectively banking the unbanked and what's so fascinating to me and I hope you'll share it is we talked about the sesame credit yeah how how you are able to use big data effectively to figure out who deserves credit and who doesn't in a marketplace where some of these people had two credit history before okay well before we do that we had a system called teach computers to learn how to ante sake products teach the computer to learn how to you know because we have a leap a lot of people try to use all the ways to cheating so we teach the computer how to do that the cheating things so we've been doing that for 10 years until now there's called artificial intelligence because we've been doing that we are update the company eight years ago we said to ourselves Alibaba should not be an e-commerce company we should be a data company because we have the data from consumers who have data from the the manufacturer of datas from logistic companies and transactions but we think of how we can make it take really beneficiary to the society what China needs is that we have a lot of great people all the small business and they have a very they're very credible but but the other we don't have a credit system for that so how can we using a credit rating system based on the data so we have put it giving everybody a sesame a rating system that is so powerful in the past four years because every individual every small business if they have been using our services we give no rating system so we're giving loans in the past five years with giving five million business loans the only bar or $5,000 three minutes we can decide whether we should give you money how much you want to get within one second the money will be in your account and zero people touch so we call three one zero even today the sesame rating system become people dating you know want to say hey you want to take you with my daughter show me your rating system of the sesame car so it's so funny we go to the people want to rent a car people want to rent a bicycle they will say show me your sesame carts good because if they do not have pay back if they do not fulfill the radiuses are going to blow down and they can never rent a house well this is what we want to build up the system that if you sell or buy fake product the sesame cars will show when open up your questions but a final one for me there's been a lot of speculation that you're going to get into the business of Hollywood your name has appeared Alibaba Group at the beginning of a couple of big films recently what is the ambition for Alibaba in the entertainment world um the beginning were like this several years we every five years we have a review for our strategy now our strategy is always to look at the 30 years and 10 years every strategic decisions we make we have to ask oneself question with this decision we make solve societal problems because we believe the biggest social property assault the most successful you are so if we do it this cannot solve any social problems we don't do it second is this project is going to be successful in 10 years if it's going to be successful in 10 years let's do it if it's going to be successful in one year or one month normally I say forget about it because why you can be successful in one year or one mouth so we all have to put perm and 5 years ago we had a big debate about 10 years later 20 years what are the things this China Society the world leaf want so we say happiness and health 2 H strategy so happiness and health we believe Holi you know the movie industry brings people happy because today nobody is happy rich people are happy poor people not happier you know at least when I watch a movie after you're happy but but so I think we should have partner with the Hollywood especially like a lot of you know we have a different way of living and in China the movie we have a lot of heroes but China movies heroes always get the American people the hero never dies if all the heroes die who want to be the hero so my movie I want to make the hero live right so this is this is I think we should learn a lot and it's only about two years so we have another eight years ago I want to make our company that it's not ecommerce it's something that giving people inspirations given people because I learn a lot for example I will say that my favorite movie Forrest the gum you know life stuff this is I learned and that inspired me that is why when people call me crazy stupid past 70 years you're crazier do something that will work you're stupid how can do that model averaging this model eBay this model yl Baba this model I told myself for is the gum set go ahead that would care about what the other people and the other thing Forrest Gump said nobody make money out of the catcher wills people make money by catching shrinks so we serve small business fair enough Jack Ma which you probably ended there because we're going to run out of time but I thank you thank you so much for the conversation I promise we speak in a question or two when we literally have two minutes and they're going to get into upset with me if you have a question of and we're going to I gotta beg you to do it within literally you know a second to go for it right there well I don't think so I think China and us should never have a trade or will never have a trade wall and I think we should getting president elect Donald Trump some time and he's open-minded he's listening and I think the world it's so easy to launch a wall but it's so difficult almost impossible sometimes to terminate a wall the Iraq war Afghanistan war is that a finish no trade war I believe one thing when trade stops the world starts trade is something that people start to communicate tray is something people exchange culture and valid and I will be happy if China USA agree on something and Alibaba business business model destroyed I would destroy Alibaba model by stopping the world fitting because how can you imagine the first largest economy of the world second largest economy of the world have a tradable it's going to be a disaster for two countries and for the world if we can anybody can do something to stop it do anything to stop it did you have a reaction to trump and the situation with Taiwan and how he's thinking about that well Taiwan I think this is this is not that something about government this is not something about business is something about people if the tower is suit is the population if you do Taiwan is like against 1.4 billion people so this is another issue so we're talking about trade we're not talking about Taiwan very politic let's take one final question if we can I think we can steal one we're in yes they're right there I'm not polishes I try to develop me a pad you store how do you assure you are not messing up these people's life and you are not dictating the whole you know credit them over the system because now you are the decision-makers you are the rule-makers okay first I'm not sure people say all this is unscented versatile world everyday versatile the only certain day was yesterday I'm not sure about that in the future I think I would dictate I would be stupid that's why I should retire early when I'm young that is why I have a lot of things that a dream I want to do I want to throughout the day I want to be a teacher I want to go back to school I want to do the environment and the world is so wonderful why you should be the see of all evil all the time I'm coming to this world not to work I want to come to this work to enjoy my life I don't want to die my office I'm going to die on the beaches it's a wonderful message Jack Ma thank you for the conference well can I say one last yeah please wait I just want to give my last advice to any people here that every government should pay attention to in the next 30 years are critical for the world every revolution tic-tac-toe revolution takes about 50 years the first configures technology company next three years the implication of the technology focus on next to 30 years the first years eBay Amazon Facebook Alibaba Google good the most important is that make the technology inclusive make the world change this is 30 years next pay attention to those people who are 30 years old because those international generation internet generation they will change the world they are the buter of the world third that let's pay attention to the company who else who have feared that 30 employees so 30 years and 30 years old and 13 projects that would can make the world much better Jack Ma thank you very very much thank you thank you thank you okay thank you thank you

Channel: World Economic Forum

Views: 1,532,275

Rating: 4.8168859 out of 5

Keywords: world economic forum, WEF, Davos 2017, Jack Ma, Alibaba, China, Chinese, entrepreneur, business, economics, Davos, globalization, Donald Trump, President Donald Trump, President Trump, trade, online trade, American, jobs, Motorola, IBM, jack ma motivation, successful people, successful people habits

Id: WsQ7ysVt-0A

Length: 32min 21sec (1941 seconds)

Published: Wed Jan 18 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/AutoModerator]

Please remember we are here as a representation of Andrew Yang. Do your part by being kind, respectful, and considerate of the humanity of your fellow users.

If you see comments in violation of our rules, please report them.

Helpful Links: Volunteer Events • Policies • Media • State Subreddits • Donate • YangLinks FAQ • Voter Registration

I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.

[u/CamCamfromtheFamFam]

Still hard to take him seriously after the elon musk discussion lmao

[u/FishyPower]

TL:DR America out sourced manufacturing to Mexico and China, service jobs to India and profited off the IP. America has the money, it just was not distributed to the people.