Alibaba.com is the business-to-business (B2B) marketplace operated by Alibaba Group. When the founder Jack Ma launched the B2B platform in 1999, his strategy was to connect Chinese companies with international B2B buyers. Twenty years later, Alibaba opened the B2B site to sellers from the United States and Europe willing to sell their products in domestic and foreign markets or export them to China, where the share of e-commerce trade imports is on the rise.
Although Alibaba highly invested in India and Brazil , the U.S. B2B e-commerce market remains the most strategic for Alibaba, which is competing with Amazon Business in the marketplace business. The financial growth of Alibaba Group in the United States faced turbulent months in 2022 when U.S. regulators investigated the e-commerce giant and other U.S. public companies headquartered in China and Hong Kong. Concerned investors of these companies claimed a lack of financial transparency and demanded deeper scrutiny. By the end of 2022, audit boards completed their investigation and cleared out possible risks of delisting – including Alibaba’s.
Worldwide growth and averted delisting
In September 2014, Alibaba Group went public on the New York Stock Exchange and achieved the second-largest initial public offering (IPO) in history. This contributed to expanding the business outside of its headquarters, since the presence of Alibaba appears to be still limited in cross-border markets. On the one hand, less than three percent of the company’s annual revenue is due to international wholesale commerce. On the other hand, outside of China, less than four in ten B2B buyers shop on Alibaba.Although Alibaba highly invested in India and Brazil , the U.S. B2B e-commerce market remains the most strategic for Alibaba, which is competing with Amazon Business in the marketplace business. The financial growth of Alibaba Group in the United States faced turbulent months in 2022 when U.S. regulators investigated the e-commerce giant and other U.S. public companies headquartered in China and Hong Kong. Concerned investors of these companies claimed a lack of financial transparency and demanded deeper scrutiny. By the end of 2022, audit boards completed their investigation and cleared out possible risks of delisting – including Alibaba’s.
