Jack Ma: The founder of Alibaba
Witness History
BBC
4.5 • 1.6K Ratings
🗓️ 6 May 2019
⏱️ 11 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The Chinese billionaire set up his online shopping site in 1999. When Alibaba first started, Jack Ma and his team were working out of a small flat in Hangzhou. The BBC's Michael Bristow has been hearing from Duncan Clark, who first worked with the internet entrepreneur in those early days.
Photo: Jack Ma attends the World Economic Forum annual meeting in Davos, Switzerland, January 2019. (Credit: REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann)
Transcript
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| 0:30.3 | BBC podcast gets underway here's something you may not know. |
| 0:34.4 | My name's Linda Davies and I commission podcast for BBC Sounds. |
| 0:38.3 | As you'd expect, at the BBC we make podcasts of the very highest quality featuring the most knowledgeable experts and genuinely |
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| 1:07.6 | You're listening to the Witness History Podcast from the BBC World Service with me Michael Bristow. |
| 1:16.0 | In 1999 a young Chinese man called Ma Yun set up an online shopping website with a group of friends. |
| 1:22.0 | Alibaba is now one of the world's richest companies |
| 1:25.0 | and its founder, known internationally as Jack Mar is a billionaire. |
| 1:29.0 | Duncan Clark was one of the first people to visit the entrepreneur and his team when the company was still working out of a small apartment in the city of Han Joe. |
| 1:37.0 | You walk up a few flights of stairs and it's a modest flat by today standards but at the time back in 99 it was quite impressive you |
| 1:44.4 | know two bedroom flat quite modern brand new at the door you would see the shoes of |
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