Chinese tech billionaire made headlines last month after visiting Donald Trump who announced Alibaba would help create one million jobs for the United States.
When Trump and Ma met last January, the former was happy to crow that the latter promised to bring a million jobs to the United States. However, critics predicted that Ma will not push through with his pledge, seeing it merely as a good P.R. opportunity as he sees it, Gizmondo reported.
Ma's gambit played off right into Trump's pledge to bring growth and get jobs for the American people despite a nine-year low in unemployment. Pundits who have followed Ma were not sold on his pitch, according to them, Ma is a great PR man, and he knows a good opportunity when he sees it. What he said are merely buzzwords that appeal to the Trump's administration that was yet to be to officially inaugurated into the U.S. seat of power at the time.
Though it is enticing for an American entrepreneur to develop a product and have it distributed through Alibaba to a country of 1.3 billion people, the big challenge is moving goods and prevent potential piracy. Alibaba is known to be a haven for counterfeits.
Last Saturday, Ma opened the Australian and New Zealand headquarters for his Alibaba e-commerce company. More than 350 business and political figures were present during Ma's opening of the Melbourne office to see the man who built his $36 billion fortune from humble beginnings.
Speaking to attendees at the auspicious event, Ma said that everybody is concerned about trade wars. He added, if trade stops, war starts. The words reverberate as a warning for Trump and his anti-globalization ideas after pulling America out of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade deal as part of his presidential memoranda on his third day in office.
Ma expressed that globalization is the future. Accordingly, the world needs globalization, it needs to trade, he said. Additionally, he said, Trade is about trust and cultural exchange, The Australian reported. Trump described the TPP as a potential disaster for the U.S., He said, he would negotiate for fair bilateral trade deals that bring jobs and industry back, in place of the TPP.
