Speaking of Ma Yun, some people think that he is full of passion, while others accuse him of being used to fooling. But in any case, he is a hero, an elusive hero, because he keeps doing things that others can't do, and has achieved the dream of starting a business, getting rich and struggling in our time-he is Ma Yun.

From "Poor Students" to English Teachers

Primary school took the key middle school exam, failed three times, and finally got what he wanted after three times in the university exam-this is basically a "poor student" in the customary sense. | stationmaster story

1September 1964 10, Ma Yun was born in an ordinary family in Hangzhou. When he was a student, Ma Yun was an urchin. Even Ma Yun once said with a smile that his primary school was a key middle school, but he failed in the exam three times, and finally got what he wanted in the college exam three times-this is basically a "poor student" in the customary sense.

Ma Yun, who is not a good student, is only proud of his English. At the beginning of the reform and opening up, more and more foreigners came to Hangzhou to travel. Ma Yun catches people practicing English by the West Lake whenever he has the chance. Although his English was poor at first, after a long time, he actually spoke fluent English, which has been used ever since.

After being admitted to Hangzhou Normal University, Ma Yun was elected as the president of the Student Union Zhu-,and later became the president of Hangzhou Student Union Zhu-. At this time, he has washed away the mark of "poor students" and started to emerge.

After graduating from 65438-0988 university, Ma Yun went to Hangzhou Institute of Electronic Technology as an English teacher. Dai Shan, who later served as vice president of Alibaba, was a student of Ma Yun at that time. She recalled that Ma Yun had become the students' favorite teacher at that time. "His class attendance rate is the highest, and there is no mandatory roll call, but students like to listen to his lectures. He often tells everyone the truth of being a man.

Although very popular with students, Ma Yun's salary is only about 1 10 yuan per month. Unwilling to be lonely, he found many part-time jobs and used his spare time as a tour guide for foreign tourists visiting Hangzhou, but such odd jobs did not obviously help his income.

From 65438 to 0992, Ma Yun and his friends established the earliest professional translation agency "Haibo translation agency" in Hangzhou, and engaged in translation business in their spare time. At that time, the operation was particularly difficult, and it often made ends meet. As soon as Ma Yun saw that this was no good, he went to Yiwu and Guangzhou with his pocket on his back to buy goods, sell gifts and wrap flowers. With this money, he supported translation agency for three years and began to make ends meet.

From fear of computers to internet company bosses

Many people have just come into contact with the Internet and are thinking about the technical problems behind it, while Ma Yun is thinking about the business model.

Translation agency didn't bring Ma any money, but gave him a chance to go abroad. In the United States, Ma Yun first came into contact with the Internet from a friend. However, at that time, Ma Yun even had a fear of the computer: "I was even afraid to touch the buttons of the computer. I thought: Who knows how much this thing is worth? If I break it, I can't afford it. "

What moved Ma Yun was that he curiously told his friends that he entered the word "beer" in the search engine and only found American and German brands. At that time, he thought that the Internet should be used to help companies in China get familiar with the world.

In fact, Ma Yun, who can be called an Internet tycoon today, has a deeper understanding of the Internet than anyone else, although he still doesn't know much about technology. Many people have just come into contact with the Internet and are thinking about the technical problems behind it, while Ma Yun is thinking about the business model.

When he has an idea, he does it. After returning home, Ma quickly resigned and borrowed $2,000. /kloc-0 founded "China Yellow Pages" in April, 1995, which is one of the earliest Internet companies in China. 1At the end of 997, Ma Yun and his team developed a series of GVM websites in Beijing, such as official website of MOFTEC and online China Commodity Exchange Market.

But for various reasons, Ma Yun found that the occupation within the system was obviously not suitable for him. At the beginning of 1999, he gave up everything in Beijing and decided to go back to Hangzhou to set up an e-commerce website that could serve small and medium-sized enterprises around the world. After returning to Hangzhou, Ma Yun and the initial entrepreneurial team began to plan a vigorous venture. Everyone decided not to borrow money from relatives and friends and raised 500 thousand. The stronghold is Ma Yun's home in Hangzhou Lakeside Garden 100 square meters, where Alibaba was born.

In this entrepreneurial team, in addition to Ma Yun, there are his wife, his colleagues and students when he was a teacher, and the elite attracted by him, such as Cai Chongxin, chief financial officer of Alibaba, who left the title of vice president of an investment company in China and his annual salary of 750,000 US dollars to receive Ma Yun's salary of several hundred yuan.

They all remember that Ma Yun said to all of them at that time: "We want to run an e-commerce company with three goals: first, we want to build a company that can survive 102; Second, we should set up an e-commerce company to serve the small and medium-sized enterprises in China. Third, we want to build the world's largest e-commerce company and rank among the top ten global websites. "

From Shrimp to Big Mac

In a sense, crazy talk was just Alibaba's survival skill at that time.

In the early days of Alibaba's establishment, the smaller the company, the better. 18 Entrepreneurs often have several jobs. Ma Yun later recalled that when he went out to take a taxi, he saw Santana coming, and his raised hand was put down again. He had to wait until Li Xia, because the latter was cheap.

Fortunately, the establishment of the website made Alibaba gradually known to many people. Businessweek from the United States and South China Morning Post in English first reported Alibaba, and made this little-known website famous overseas.

A few years ago, many people accused Ma Yun of always talking nonsense. Actually, I can't blame him. How did you make the company famous when it was shrimp? Advertising is obviously not Alibaba's strong point at that time, and the only thing that can be relied on is the power of the media. In a sense, crazy talk was just Alibaba's survival skill at that time.

However, Alibaba, which has a certain popularity, will soon face a funding bottleneck: there is no money in the company's account. Peng Lei, now vice president of Alibaba, was in charge of money at that time. She recalled that Ma Yun began to meet some investors at that time, but he didn't want money, but chose carefully. Even though he was short of money, he turned down 38 investors. Ma Yun later said that he hoped that Alibaba's first venture capital investment would not only bring money, but also bring more non-capital elements, such as further venture capital and other overseas resources. And these rejected investors can't bring him these.

At this time, an old relationship between Cai Chongxin, now the CFO of Alibaba, and Goldman Sachs, the investment bank, solved the urgent need for Alibaba. A group of investment banks, mainly Goldman Sachs, invested $5 million in Alibaba. This "angel fund" made Ma Yun breathe a sigh of relief.

What surprised him even more was that bigger investors also noticed him and Alibaba. 1in the autumn of 1999, Masayoshi Son, president of Japan Softbank, met with Ma Yun. Sun was the richest man in Asia at that time, with assets of 3 trillion yen. Masayoshi son directly asked Ma Yun how much money he wanted, and Ma Yun's answer was that he didn't need money. Sun Zhengyi asked, "Why did you come to me when you were not short of money?" Ma Yun's answer is: "I am not looking for you. I was asked to see you. "

This classic answer did not offend Sun Zhengyi. After meeting for the first time, Ma Yun and Cai Chongxin soon met Masayoshi Son again in Tokyo. Sun Zhengyi said that he would invest $30 million in Alibaba, accounting for 30% of the shares. However, Ma Yun believes that there is still too much money. After six minutes of thinking, Ma Yun finally decided to invest 20 million US dollars in Softbank, and Alibaba's management team still holds absolute control.

Spring after winter

Ma Yun finally climbed the peak he set, and this may be just the beginning.

From April 2000, the Nasdaq index began to plummet and remained in a downturn for two years, which led many Internet companies to get into trouble and even close down. But Alibaba is safe and sound. | stationmaster story

A very important reason is that Alibaba has received $25 million in financing, and this website has never been in the habit of spending money indiscriminately. More importantly, Ma Yun's persistent belief. At that time, he said to his colleagues: "Even if you live on your knees, you only need to live for one day."

At that time, the whole society had a distrust of the Internet. Although Alibaba is not short of money, its business is particularly difficult. Ma Yun proposed to close the door, make the products well and go out in the spring.

Even after encountering SARS, Ma Yun's belief of never giving up still infected everyone in the company. It is a miracle that all people work from home, but their performance has gone up instead of down.

Winter passed quickly, and in 2003, the spring of the Internet began to come slowly. On February 17, 2004, Ma Yun announced in Beijing that Alibaba had once again received a huge strategic investment of 82 million US dollars. This investment was the largest private equity fund in China at that time.

The story after that is already familiar to everyone. We opened Taobao, Alipay, Yahoo China and Ali Software, which went public today. Ma Yun finally climbed the peak he set, and this may be just the beginning.