ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
The first person I want to thank, of course, is Jack Ma. I am deeply grateful for his invitation to join Alibaba on its wonderful journey and for all his guidance and support over the last eighteen years. He has greatly influenced my thinking about the future and strategy. Many concepts presented in this book, such as customer-to-business (C2B) and network coordination, coalesced in the endless discussions we had.
I have benefited enormously from the interaction with thousands of colleagues across Alibaba’s many businesses, from Yahoo! to e-commerce, from cloud to finance. Almost everything I know about the internet is because of the education they have given me. I cannot name all these colleagues individually, but I am eternally grateful for their insight and energy.
I have been working on this book for the last four years. My strategy team has been true collaborators during this time as we worked through the ideas described in the book. Yu Li, as my deputy, has been of great assistance. Li Junling, Zhang Xiaofan, and Yang Renbin have contributed many original ideas to our conversations.
Nick Rosenbaum, my assistant for the last three years, has played an indispensable role. He has participated in every stage of this book. His competence and purposefulness have always exceeded my expectations. Rita Koselka contributed greatly in editing the book, especially in putting the final draft together. Melinda Merino, my editor at Harvard Business Review Press, was very quick to grasp what I was trying to say in the first rough draft. She pushed for a concise framework that really put my work into focus. Without her capable guidance and the hard work of everyone behind the scenes at HBRP, especially our heroic copyeditor Patty Boyd, the book not only would have taken much longer, but would also have been much less accessible to readers.
They say it takes a village to raise a child; in my case, it takes an ecosystem to write a book. Without the many tens of millions of people who have built China’s e-commerce industry from little more than their own grit, this tiny book could not exist. Over the years, I have had the honor of talking with innumerable sellers, lecturers, Taobao partners, delivery personnel, web celebs, independent service vendors, and more. These people have done far more than enrich my own understanding: they are pioneers in the wilderness. Their tenacity, diligence, and optimism have created a vibrant oasis on what was once barren ground. Our revolution from the periphery is a success.
On a last note of gratitude, I have been lucky enough to work and engage in stimulating discussion with hundreds of adventurous businesspeople in China and elsewhere over the last twenty years. They have created businesses large and small, experienced setbacks and even failure. Their efforts to use business to improve the world around them have inspired and challenged me. I hope this book will be of some assistance to them and to you.
Finally, it is my job and calling in life to find, analyze, and assist you, the entrepreneurs and thinkers who are creating the future. Your work can be hard and lonely. Wherever you are in the world, if this book and its ideas resonate with you and your dreams of the future of business, please continue the conversation through e-mail via [email protected]. I would be delighted to engage with you.