Multi-aspects of Ma Yun
“Trust makes things simple”, this is one of the most impressive remarks in the speech made at the evening party of “Taobao’s tenth anniversary” on May 10 by Ma Yun, president of the board of Alibaba. Just as what Ma Yun himself and many media have pointed out, the reason why Taobao can exist and develop is the trust among people- when people bought things online, they haven’t even seen the items before, then it is trust that make transactions smoothly. Undoubtedly, Taobao and Alipay have made many efforts in realizing China’s online shopping and even in rebuilding the social trust in China.
Of course, when Ma Yun was making the remark, he didn’t just want to say that Alibaba was a trustable company, and was also a working summary for himself in Alibaba for fourteen years. Because of the trust of all staff in Alibaba, so he can bring Alibaba to today’s situation.
If viewing from the development history of Alibaba, Ma Yun is really worth trusting: its employees rise from 18 from the initial starting of a business to over 20,000 by now, and its operating revenue also ranks the first among Chinese Internet companies. According to the documents submitted by Yahoo Company recently, in the fourth quarter of 2012, the operating revenue of Alibaba Group increased 80% on year-on-year basis and reached 1.84 billion dollars, and the net profit rose significantly at 156% on year-on-year basis and reached 650 million dollars. For the reason why Alibaba can realize today’s scale, of course Ma Yun, the founder, has made the greatest contribution.
Then, does it mean that Ma Yun is a person who is worthy of trust and entrustment? I’m afraid not. Judging an entrepreneur like Ma Yun, it is not enough to judge him only from the financial data of the enterprise, but more importantly, we should judge what values are transmitted by these entrepreneurs to the society.
From the words and deeds of Ma Yun in public occasions, trust is a word that he has mentioned most, and even has become a mission of the Alibaba Group, for example, the brand concept of Alipay is “trust” and “guarantee.” According to the introduction of Alipay, as the brand new brand slogan, “Alipay, understanding your entrustment” was officially announced to the public in May 2011, and it further emphasized the feelings and value behind payment and the sense of social responsibility of Alipay. At the same time, “it is both the promise among Alipay and governmental agencies, financial partners, merchants and users, and it is also the promise between Alipay Company and employees.”
But from the change of the ownership structure of Alipay Company, the behaviors of Ma Yun obliviously have disappointed the trust from other shareholders.
In June 2011, Alibaba Group transferred the ownership of Aplipay, its wholly-owned subsidiary, to a new company that Ma Yun serves as the CEO-Zhejiang Alibaba E-Commerce Co., Ltd.. Though Ma Yun said that he had to do it in order to conform to the state supervision policies and fully considering the benefits of users of Taobao and Alipay, most people believe that without the permission of the board of directors, Ma Yun transferred the shares of Alipay from Alibaba Group, inflicting the legal interests of Yahoo and SoftBank, major shareholders of Alibaba Group. The behavior of Ma Yun is actually for the purpose of “private interests” in the name of “national interests.”
Viewing from the current reports, Yahoo and SoftBank, the two major shareholders, are against the decision. But since what is done cannot be undone, they have to negotiate with Ma Yun’s team on the issue of compensation. Though on May 21, 2012, Yahoo and Ma Yun reached an agreement on the issue of stock rights, and according to the content of the agreement, the 1 billion dollars investment in those years have become the current market value of 14 billion dollars. But Ma Yun’s words and deeds for this issue really run counter to the “trust” boasted by him: how to talk about the basic trust if even the shares of other people are not been respected?
We may even imagine that Alibaba Group were a state-owned enterprise, what result would occur for such a behavior of Ma Yun? If it were true, Ma Yun firstly would be investigated by relevant departments in the name of “embezzlement of state-owned assets” - without the permission of the board of directors, transferring the core assets of a state-owned holding company under his control, this is of course a very serious crime. In those years, Li Jingwei, founder of Jianlibao, only embezzled several million yuan’s state-owned assets for purchasing life insurance for himself, was investigated under the charge of the embezzlement of state-owned assets, and finally was sentenced 15 years’ imprisonment for the crime of corruption.
By comparison, the nature of Ma Yun goes even farther than that of Li Jingwei. But, from the explanation of Ma Yun for this matter, he doesn’t feel guilty for it, but thinks that “it is not perfect but the decision is correct.” Viewing from today’s market reaction, Ma Yun’s team has made a correct bet, and the operation of Alibaba by his team is also excellent. But even so, everything that has been carried out by Ma Yun’s team for gaining the corporate right of control dishonors his commitments.
“In the bustling world, people come and go all for the purpose of gaining benefits,” and facing the huge profits, we all will be tempted. Just because the benefits are too important, therefore when we gain benefits, we all need to comply with the basic game rules. In a modern society of rule of law, respecting other people’s properties is a basic rule. Obviously, Ma Yun’s team has not abided by the relevant rules, and even has triggered their own crisis of “trust.”
To tell the truth, from that moment, I began to change the views on Ma Yun, and I have thereby even reduced the shopping on Taobao and have reduced the using Alipay-Ma Yun can inflict the benefits of shareholders for his own benefits, will he inflict consumers because of his benefits? I even have such a doubt: does Ma Yun really believe “trust”? Or he just wants to let everyone believe him so that he can gain huge commercial interests? When thinking of this, I tremble with fear.
Originally published on Tencent DAJIA Column | 2013-5-13
