Jack Ma: The Success Story Of A Chinese Entrepreneur

Jack Ma’s Early Life and Career Journey

Ma Yun; professionally known as Jack Ma is one of the successful entrepreneurs of recent time. Jack Ma is a Chinese entrepreneur and he is the co-founder of Alibaba Group. In trade, Ma has worth estimated of $42 billion and it includes almost 7.8% of the stake of Alibaba (Kim et al. 2017). Alibaba Group is famous e-commerce group in China. Jack Ma grew up in communist China and Ma was rejected from many job interviews and Alibaba was his third internet business attempt.

Jack Ma was born in 1964 in Hangzhou and it is in the South-eastern part of China. Jack Ma has a younger sister and an elder brother. His family did not have much money. Ma lived in a place which is the hometown of tourists and Ma learnt English from there. Ma failed in the university-entrance exam twice, he finally passed the exam on the third try. He went to attend Hangzhou Teachers Institute and he graduated in the year 1988. After getting maximum rejections; he was hired as an English teacher. First Ma Started a translation business and he tried to assist a Chinese firm to recover the payment. His first two attempts failed and he assembled 17 of his friends in the apartment to start an online marketplace. This ‘Alibaba’ site allowed the exporters to post about product listing. In the year 1999, his online platform gathered the funding of $25 million and Yahoo also invested $1 billion in Alibaba venture (Tan et al. 2017). Revenue of Alibaba Group at present reached Yen 250 billion and Alibaba Group provides the services and products like an online auction, mobile commerce, e-commerce, online money transfer and online shopping.

Timmons Model of entrepreneurship has three critical factors for a successful venture and these three factors are teams, opportunities and resources. The successful entrepreneur needs to balance three factors in order to make the successful entrepreneurship. As stated by Timmons and Spinelli (1994), the entrepreneur finds for the opportunity and after finding the opportunity; the entrepreneur shapes the opportunity into the high-potential venture through drawing up the team by gathering the required resource. In order to start the business; the entrepreneur capitalizes the opportunity putting the risk of his/her career, net worth and cash flow.

Opportunity factor is the entrepreneur’s idea about recognising the underlying marketing demand which determines the potential idea of the business. The idea can become viable when the entrepreneur anchors the services or the products which can create or add value to the consumers. The business plan and the financial projection come secondary as the identification of viable opportunity is most important. Opportunity in the market can make the business plan full-proof (Morris and Kuratko 2014).

After identifying the opportunity in the market; the entrepreneur starts the business by selecting the team. The nature and size of the opportunity in the market shape the team. A good team is indispensable with the success and good team can unlock the higher potential of the business. Roles of the team are to remove the ambiguity and opportunity by applying the creativity and to provide the leadership to control the available resources in an effective manner.

Alibaba Group and Its Founding

Extensive resources can reduce the risk to start a venture and it encourages bootstrapping (Fernhaber et al. 2014). The advantages of bootstrapping are associated with instilling the creative resources and driving down the marketing cost and encouraging the creative resources.

                                         

In the year the 1990s; Jack came to know about the internet and he began to observe the internet as a new trend in technology. In the year 1995, Jack Ma visited the US for the first time and that time Ma already had begun the translation company to use China’s export boom. Jack Ma has introduced the word ‘internet’ and he first searched for the word ‘beer’. Jack Ma was astonished to find that there was no such Chinese beer name came into the search result. Ma did not find anything related to China on the internet. Jack Ma decided to open ‘Chinapage’ which was the directory of various Chinese companies looking for the customers abroad. Chinapage was one of the first internet-based organisations in China. The success of China page led to Jack appoint as head of firm China Electronic Commerce Centre (Kim et al. 2017). Chinapage organisation did not work and after four years; Ma knew that internet business has the maximum opportunity. Jack founded Alibaba with the help of some of his friends and the intention was to make a website to be more likely a one-stop solution for the business-to-business transaction. In addition, Jack Ma had intuition that the internet has enough potential to reach a large number of customers. Jack Ma believed that internet has the opportunity and he was able to face the issues which came to his way. Jack was able to find the gap in the Chinese market at that time Chinse market lacked the internet based business. Alibaba.com fulfilled the demand in the Chinese market and he also started ‘Taobao’ (Thewisdompost.com 2018). This particular website started trending over the internet and it became top e-commerce in China.

After identifying the opportunity through internet business; Jack Ma tried to launch the business. In order to build the team; Jack started the team with only 17 people. Jack had experience in working with the government and he failed in making the partnership with government. Jack Ma developed the distaste for governmental bureaucracy and he did not run the organisation like a bureaucrat. Jack Ma hired the people who loved their job and who had the passion for doing their work skilfully. Jack Ma always tried to rectify the mistakes and he concentrated on making his existing team stronger. Jack Ma and his team took the business decision and one of the significant factors of the team was that Jack Ma always tried to choose the women on the team. Jack Ma and his team began to be identified in the overseas. The company received funding from overseas business organisations as well. As stated by Feldman et al. (2014), software engineers made the software and he trusts his team to make empower of the organisation, it is one of the leadership functions of the organisation. Jack Ma wanted to know at the initial stage that it is very difficult for an organisation to pull everyone’s head in the same direction.

The Timmons Model of Entrepreneurship

Resources of the organisation must be creative and it can provide stingy strategies to gain control over the resources. The discipline of leanness in resources can lead towards the capital efficiency of the organisation (Mauer et al. 2017). Jack Ma in the early stages attempted to raise funds in Silicon Valley and he was unsuccessful and he was criticised for using this business model. However, Jack Ma had succeeded in attracting Goldman Sachs to invest $5 million and SoftBank of Japan also invested $20 million in Alibaba (Thewisdompost.com 2018). However, the resources Alibaba are the funding, teamwork, the CEO and the technological support. Alibaba went unprofitable till the time of 2003 and Ma launched the online auction business named ‘Taobao.com’. In order to keep afloat in the Chinese economy, Ma and his team provided the peripheral value-added support services (Scarborough 2016). Alibaba.com uses the unique business model as it has three core businesses (YiDaTong, Taobao and 1688). According to Zhao (2016), Alibaba has unconventional profit model as the maximum profit of Alibaba Group comes from the keyword bidding, advertisement and it represents 57% of the total profits.

It has been concluded that Jack Ma has been living in the future and he has a voracious craving to increase the present circumstance of his life. Jack Ma is an ace communicator and he is a perfect business person. Jack Ma identified the importance and capability of the internet and he united the team under the single goal. Changing the approach is another key to grab the success rather than the uniting the company under the vision of one person. Jack Ma has the foresight to develop the business and he had creative thinking skills. One of the most important factors for the success of Jack Ma was that he hired the employees with superior skills which helped Ma to carry out the important pillar of a great company. The venture of Alibaba was successful; however, he tasted failure twice before and like other leaders, he learnt most from the hardships and obstacles. Successful launching of the business was possible as Ma does not find competitors as his enemies. The perfect combination of the team working good set of resources and he identified the right gap in the market. Jack Ma built his empire in the rapidly developing world and his venture has the potential to achieve more.

The green restaurant is a new concept as this type of restaurant is environment-friendly. Prime Restaurant will be an environment-friendly restaurant which will offer Chinese, Indian and Continental food items. Prime Restaurant is going to be an upscale restaurant which will offer both rooftop seating and interior seating facility. Interior seating will have a touch of green and the rooftop will also have a slight touch of green and grass. Apart from the soothing atmosphere, the restaurant will have perfect waste management; energy efficient appliances, recycled paper goods and the kitchen chimney will be furnished in a perfect way so that it may not emit harmful gas. The supply chain of the restaurant will be environment-friendly and sustainably. The restaurant will have the capability of seating arrangement for 70 customers. The speciality of the restaurant will be global food items prepared by world-class chefs and it will offer lunch and dinner. Prime Restaurant will offer some of the famous Hong Kong-based dishes also; such as Wontons, Roast Goose, Shrimp, Phoenix, Fish Balls and wind sand chicken.

Key Partners · Local raw material suppliers · Waste management agencies · Green markets · Interior designers	Key activities · Good customer service · Fast and efficient service · Excellent food quality · Qualified staffs · Best chefs	Value Proposition · Healthy food and soothing atmosphere · Customers will be able to choose their preferred food dishes from diverse choices · There will be employees who will guide the customers regarding choices · Green restaurant · Rooftop seating facility	Customer Relationship · Prime Restaurant will make its website from where the customers can get to know about their offers, menu and the customers can order for home delivery · The customers can write on the social networking pages regarding their likes and dislikes	Customer segments Prime Restaurant will target the upper-middle-class people who want to have quality, healthy food from a diverse range of dishes across the global The restaurant will also target the young generation who can visit in groups
Key resources · Financial resources · Raw materials providers · Human resources · Relationship with waste management	Channels Website Third party food delivery app Direct selling The customers can directly call the restaurant for the reservation of seats and they can order the food
Cost structure · Website and app development cost · Restaurant set up the cost · Marketing and PR campaign · Equipment buying	Revenue streams · The restaurant will gain money through the selling of the food · The initial set up of the restaurant will be high; ROI will be higher · The restaurant will start the membership subscription for the frequent visitors

Opportunity Factor

Hong Kong food restaurant sales had reduced by 10.5% in the first half of 2016; however, it has increased by 2.5% in the first quarter of 2018 (Statista.com 2018). Food & Beverage industry has continued to shine in recent time as out of 73 international entrants in Hong Kong; 37 of them were from food & beverage sector. The restaurant industry is mainly based on the streets and outlets where the customers want to have the local foods and global dishes. The restaurants in Hong Kong welcome the local customers with low-cost pricing. Tourists’ visits are large in Hong Kong and local street foods are famous among the tourists. Burgers and beers are famous among the international travellers and with people opting the fast food over the fine dining. However, wealthy local customers and the tourists find the fine dining options with rich atmosphere; the customers also find more innovative menus and promotions from the restaurant. Sales revenue in restaurant and catering industry in Hong Kong is 113.4 Hong Kong dollars in 2018 and sales revenue of the restaurant industry would reach 123 billion in Hong Kong dollars in 2019 (Smart 2017).

			2019	2020
	Gross revenue		$4,125,000	$4,207,500
	Cost of goods sold		$320,000	$326,400
	Gross margin		$3,805,000	$3,881,100
	Other revenue [source]		$100,000	$100,000
	Interest income		$0	$0
	Total revenue		$3,905,000	$3,981,100
Operating expenses
	Sales and marketing		$80,000	$81,600
	Payroll and payroll taxes		$100,000	$102,000
	Depreciation		$153,000	$156,060
	Maintenance, repair, and overhaul		$0	$0
	Total operating expenses		$333,000	$339,660
Operating income			$3,572,000	$3,641,440
	Interest expense on long-term debt		$0	$0
Operating income before other items		$3,572,000	$3,641,440
	Loss (gain) on sale of assets		$0	$0
	Other unusual expenses (income)		$0	$0
Earnings before taxes			$3,572,000	$3,641,440
Taxes on income		30%	$1,071,600	$1,092,432
Net income (loss)			$2,500,400	$2,549,008
Assets	Initial balance	2019	2020
	Cash and short-term investments	$500,000	$956,800	$2,689,436
	Accounts receivable	100,000	1,000,000	1,000,000
	Total inventory	250,000	500,000	500,000
	Prepaid expenses	35,000	500,000	500,000
	Deferred income tax	15,000	150,000	150,000
	Other current assets	250,000	250,000	250,000
	Total current assets	$1,150,000	$3,356,800	$5,089,436
	Buildings	$500,000	$500,000	$500,000
	Land	100,000	100,000	100,000
	Capital improvements	$                     120,000	120,000	120,000
	Machinery and equipment of kitchen	$                     145,000	145,000	145,000
	Less: Accumulated depreciation expense	0	153,000	309,060
	Net property/equipment	$865,000	$712,000	$555,940
	Goodwill	$50,000	$50,000	$50,000
	Deferred income tax	50,000	50,000	50,000
	Long-term investments	250,000	250,000	250,000
	Deposits	2,500,000	2,500,000	2,500,000
	Other long-term assets	2,500,000	2,500,000	2,500,000
	Total assets	$7,365,000	$9,418,800	$10,995,376
Liabilities	Initial balance	2019	2020
	Accounts payable	$65,000	$65,000	$65,000
	Accrued expenses	0	0	0
	Notes payable/short-term debt	0	0	0
	Capital leases	0	0	0
	Other current liabilities	0	0	0
	Total current liabilities	$65,000	$65,000	$65,000
	Long-term debt from loan payment calculator	95,000	$0	$0
	Other long-term debt	$0	$0	$0
	Total debt	$160,000	$65,000	$65,000
	Other liabilities	0	0	0
	Total liabilities	$160,000	$65,000	$65,000
Equity		Initial balance	2019	2020
	Owner’s equity (common)	$500,000	$500,000	$500,000
	Paid-in capital	0	0	0
	Preferred equity	0	0	0
	Retained earnings	100,000	100,000	100,000
	Total equity	$600,000	$600,000	$600,000
	Total liabilities and equity	$760,000	$665,000	$665,000

The restaurant business is not new as entrepreneurship venture; however, the green restaurant is a new concept which will attract the customers as Prime Restaurant will be perceived as the environment-friendly and responsible business venture. The strengths of the business venture will be a business concept as the customers can relate to the business easily. In Hong Kong market; restaurant industry has potential as the young generation wants to have the good ambience with quality food. The marketing campaign for the business will open up the new customer segment and the concept of ‘green’ will increase the brand image of the organisation. On the other side; restaurant industry and food and beverage market in Hong Kong has been going through a gloomy phase. Most importantly, the travellers and the local customers both want to have food items from a local restaurant or street shops. Prime Restaurant will be an upscale restaurant and the customers need to spend money on the quality food. The operating cost of the environment-friendly restaurant will be high and customer relations need to be good.

We, the owners of the business shall calculate total start-up cash needed for the business and overall attractiveness of the similar business needs to consider. We should assess the feasibility of raising enough money to fund the capital requirement. We shall use the saving and take a loan from the bank. Financial feasibility is based on cost estimate and we shall spend $339,660 in 2020. Calculating the cash flows will be generated by the strategy discounted to Net Present Value (NPV). We shall invest costs; however, these are non-financial returns. Organisational feasibility refers to the proposed business must have the sufficient management expertise, resources and competence. The prime restaurant will have managerial ability to use proper resources and competency to make the venture successful. The structure of the business will follow the hierarchy where owners will be on the top. We shall hire the skilled employees based on the resumes. Professional skills of the employees will be higher as this will help the restaurant to provide customer satisfaction.

I want to take up the venture as I have always been thrilled to start my own venture in the shape of the restaurant. This business will require a good amount of money to start and I believe that I can make the business successful. The capital requirement will be fulfilled through a bank loan and I will recruit only educated staffs. I have learnt that entrepreneurship venture must have a good team, resources; I think I will be able to make a good team and I will use the right set of resources to make the business successful. In addition, Hong Kong restaurant industry has the opportunity to start the new venture of the restaurant. Reviewing the demographic and economic statistics of Hong Kong; it is clear that people like to have the street food and demand in restaurant food is not sustainable. Upscale restaurant in Hong Kong can attract the customers how belong to upper class and after comparing the local data which is similar to state or region determining the strengths and weakness of the individual market.

Criteria	Score
The attractiveness of idea: Would you enjoy doing it?	5
Ability to undertake: Do you have the skills needed to do it?	5
Practicality: Is it something that really can be done?	4
Potential market demand: Will customers buy it?	3
Ability to combat competition: Is there competition and can you combat it in some way?	4
Ability to differentiate: Can you differentiate it in some way that can be sustained over a long period?	4
Price potential: Can you avoid competing simply on price?	4
Resource availability:  Do you think you have, or can get, the resources you need to start up this business?	3

Reference:

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Fernhaber, S.A., Gilbert, B.A. and McDougall, P.P., 2014. International entrepreneurship and geographic location: an empirical examination of new venture internationalization. In Location of International Business Activities (pp. 94-136). Palgrave Macmillan, London.

Kim, S., Zhang, X.A. and Zhang, B.W., 2017. Self-mocking crisis strategy on social media: Focusing on Alibaba chairman Jack Ma in China. Public Relations Review, 42(5), pp.903-912.

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Zhao, Y., 2016. Entrepreneurial mindset. Education for Sustainable Happiness and Well Being, Routledge: New York, pp.66-84.