Since coronavirus took away the joys of everyday life from us, the world experienced an unprecedented rise of 699% in online sales. Faced with this abundance of choice, making decisions seems more challenging than ever. Which platform to use? Which company is the most stable?
In this article, we summed up the most recent Alibaba statistics to help you figure it all out—how stable the company is, how it works, how different it is from Amazon, and how it fits into the big picture of tech giants which will shape our future.
If you live anywhere outside of China, chances are you may be hesitant to order a cheap, yet cool, trinket you discovered on AliExpress, which is a part of Alibaba Group. This post might go a long way towards changing your perception in this regard.
Top 10 Alibaba Facts to Get You Started
- The company’s estimated worth is $800 billion.
- Alibaba stocks hit a record in 2020.
- Deliveries will be made by autonomous robots starting from 2021.
- Alibaba made a total of $38.4 billion in a single day.
- Alibaba will be no. 1 blockchain patent holder by the end of the year.
- They employ 117,600 people.
- Alibaba’s net profit was $1.4 billion higher than Amazon’s in 2019.
- Alibaba’s cloud business grew 58.5% in June 2020.
- Alibaba doesn’t have warehouses and doesn’t do direct selling.
- Alibaba Group had the highest IPO in the history of the US.
Alibaba Stats You Should Know Before Hitting ‘Order’
1. The company’s estimated worth is $800 billion.
(Techspot)
After a sharp rise of its stocks, Alibaba Group regained the trust of investors and proved to be a company with a flexible business model that secures ROI even in the most challenging times and despite the odds.
2. Alibaba stocks hit a record in 2020.
(WSJ)
While the world is waiting for an economic crisis, the official stock market stats show that Alibaba stock rate has gone up by 42%. This re-established their position among the most valuable tech businesses in the world, which was compromised after a messy Q1 of 2020 due to COVID-19 lockdowns and restrictions.
3. Alibaba.com has more than 150,000 registered sellers.
(DigitalCommerce)
Apart from Amazon and eBay, Alibaba.com is known to be one of the largest and most important B2B platforms. When it comes to Alibaba, the number of sellers is large enough to cover a market of 150 million registered members and over 10 million active buyers.
4. Alibaba Group doesn’t have warehouses and doesn’t do direct selling.
(Investopedia)
Alibaba is an ecommerce company that functions as an online marketplace with the purpose of connecting SMEs with potential customers. The Group doesn’t own warehouses to store the offered goods, has no channels of distribution, and does not engage in direct sales, but instead serves as an intermediary. It could be argued that these factors are at least partly responsible for the impressive Alibaba sales statistics.
5. The company employs 117,600 people.
(Techspot)
Despite being larger than Amazon (which employs over 700,000 people) in some respects, Alibaba Group has a drastically lower number of employees as a result of its unique business model. As we mentioned, the company has no warehouses or distribution channels, thus needing less staff to function.
6. Alibaba Group had the highest IPO in the history of the US.
(Britannica)
Founded in 1999, the company was slowly growing until 2005 when Yahoo! discovered it and decided to invest, buying a 40% stake in the company.
Alibaba annual sales kept going up, and the company eventually appeared on the NY Stock Exchange in September 2014. Its IPO turned out to be the highest one for an internet company in the history of the US, totaling $168 billion.
7. Alibaba made a total of $38.4 billion in a single day.
(HBR)
On November 11 every year, Alibaba takes the center stage in the shopping frenzy, watching (and helping) the global consumer spending stats for the year go through the roof.
You may think that Black Friday or Cyber Monday are the most hectic events of this kind, but keep in mind that, according to Alibaba statistics, their activity levels on Singles Day were over 2.5 times higher than the sales made on both events mentioned above. Wanna hear a fun fact? The co-founder of Alibaba called this result a financial disappointment!
8. Alibaba Group has 14 subsidiaries.
(Alibaba Group)
As we already mentioned, Alibaba Group Holdings Ltd. is an internet company which declares itself as an online marketplace. However, they have found a way to grow and expand by forming a network of Alibaba Group subsidiaries which specialize in a broad spectrum of services (from finance to groceries): Taobao, Tmall, Freshippo, Ant Group, DingTalk, Lazada Group, South China Morning Post, Intime Department Store, Alibaba Pictures Group, 1688, Youku, AliExpress, Alibaba Cloud, Cainiao.
9. They have been named the top company in Fortune magazine’s ‘Change the World’ ranking.
(Alizila)
While the world was facing the COVID-19 crisis, Alibaba Group rose to the occasion and employed its resources to procure and distribute medical supplies worldwide. The official Alibaba customs data shows that the company sourced and delivered over 26 million pieces of protective medical equipment outside of China. Fortune magazine recognized their efforts and made them the number one individual company on their list, although they ranked 37th in 2019.
10. Alibaba’s owner, the richest person in China, used to be an English teacher.
(Forbes) (Britannica)
One of the commonly known Alibaba facts is that the way they got started is one of those inspirational small business success stories that illustrate the value of unwavering determination.
Jack Ma, the legendary visionary behind the company, got the idea after his 1995 trip to the US when he first came into contact with the internet and realized that the lack of websites in China is actually an opportunity. In 1999, he managed to convince his colleagues to leave the government company they worked for, and they founded what we today know as the Alibaba Group.
Only 20 years after its launch, Alibaba made Jack Ma one of the most influential people on the planet—he was the richest man in China in 2019 (not likely to have changed in 2020); number seven on the list of the richest people in tech in 2017, and he ranked 17th on the list of world’s richest billionaires for 2020.
11. Alibaba market share in 2020 accounts for 58% of the Chinese retail market.
(Investopedia) (Repricer)
This means that Alibaba provides services to around 755 million online shoppers and has little competition. According to the latest online shopping statistics, its main competitor on the global market is Amazon. However, when we take a look at their market share, Amazon holds 39% of American ecommerce sales.
12. There are 11 rules you have to know when ordering from China to the US.
(USA Customs)
When it comes to ordering/importing goods from Alibaba, US Customs data indicates that there are 11 established incoterms you have to keep in mind when it comes to China-US trade. Also, while you do not need a general importing permit, you should check if the goods you are importing (ordering in larger quantities) are on the list of goods that have to be reported to one of the government agencies overseeing trade: FDA, DOT, USDA…
Suppose there are things you really wish to order and have delivered from Alibaba rather than from Amazon. In that case, aside from the Alibaba shipping rates, you also have to keep in mind a couple of things like tariffs and restrictions which frequently change due to the ongoing trade war (you can always check these on the website of the US Customs), shipping, payment methods and following the US guidelines concerning the safety of the product.
Alibaba Excels at Cutting-Edge Technologies
13. Alibaba’s cloud business grew 58.5% in June 2020.
(CNBC)
The available Alibaba statistics for 2020 indicate that the cloud computing branch accounts for 8% of the company’s revenue and that it is by far one of the fastest-growing ventures started by the Alibaba Group in recent years.
Despite still being behind the already established names of cloud computing like Amazon and Microsoft, the company is determined to reach the top by investing 200 billion yuan ($29,692,980,000) into this branch by 2023.
14. Deliveries will be made by autonomous robots starting 2021.
(Retaildetail)
Alibaba Group’s R&D Institute announced a breakthrough—starting 2021, deliveries will be made by Xiaomanlv, which should boost the already impressive delivery-related Alibaba statistics.
This autonomous robot uses cutting edge technologies such as big data, deep learning, and geo-localization, which provide it with the ability to make around 500 deliveries a day within a 62 miles (100 km) range.
15. Alibaba will be no. 1 blockchain patent holder by the end of the year.
(Coindesk) (Bitcoin)
Staying ahead of the curve when it comes to cryptocurrency trends and the developments in AI is essential for any company that intends to survive the coming changes. Alibaba is currently running the show, leaving behind even the tech giants such as IBM.
The available data on Alibaba trends shows that Alibaba Group has filed 1,505 patent applications, while the second place goes to Tencent, which has ‘only’ 742 patents.
Compared to these Chinese companies, IBM is lagging behind with 240 blockchain patents.
16. Alibaba’s Apsara stores data in over 100,000 servers.
(Alibaba Cloud)
After Oracle failed to keep up with the needs of its growing databases, Alibaba decided to venture into big data engine projects, establishing Apsara and Alibaba Cloud in 2009. By 2013, they already stored their data on 5,000 servers.
The number of logistic breakdowns that the Alibaba data center platform caused? Zero.
17. Alibaba is the third biggest provider for IaaS.
(Businesswire)
The company’s cloud computing service has millions of customers and covers 21 regions around the world. Currently, Alibaba Group holds a 9.1% share in the global market, and 28.2% in the Asia Pacific market.
Alibaba and Amazon Stats to Settle All Bets
18. Amazon makes four times as much revenue, but Alibaba is still more profitable.
(Stock News) (Ecommerce DB) (Techspot)
Comparing the global success of the companies in 2019 shows a significant revenue discrepancy—according to the latest Amazon statistics, they reported $280.52 billion, while Alibaba profit stats show that their revenue for the year was $72 billion.
However, the gross profit margin indicates a better result on the Chinese side (44.5% for Alibaba, and 40.3% for Amazon). To be precise, Alibaba made a profit of $13 billion, while Amazon made $11.58 billion.
19. Alibaba Group reports higher ROE and ROA.
(Stock News)
The growth rate of Alibaba and the latest stock data shows that Alibaba Group boasts higher Return on Equity and Return on Assets rates, at 21.51% and 5.5%, respectively.
Amazon reported an ROE of 20.79% and ROA of 4.65%.
20. Alibaba is split into three businesses, while Amazon has a single core business.
(Investopedia)
Although both are essentially ecommerce companies, they have completely opposite approaches to doing business. This just might turn out to be one of the deciding factors in the battle of Alibaba vs Amazon.
Amazon is a single entity. Alibaba Group, on the other hand, splits its actions into three core subsidiaries: Alibaba, Taobao, and Tmall. This provides the Chinese company with a chance to be more agile and answer to market challenges faster, which is why, as of June 2019, their combined user base has been larger than the population of America.
FAQs
What is the turnover of Alibaba?
(Statista) (Trefis)
Alibaba Group’s revenue in the fiscal year 2019 was 509.7 billion yuan ($72 billion).
In 2020, they are projected to make $75 billion, with the largest portion (65%) of it coming from their China Commerce division.
Their International Commerce and Cloud Computing revenue streams are expected to be responsible for 8% of the total each, while China Wholesale and Other Revenue should account for 12%.
Is Alibaba or Amazon bigger?
(Techspot)
Amazon is definitely a bigger company, measured by the number of employees needed to keep the business running. By the latest available data, Amazon provides over 700,000 jobs, while the Alibaba Group employs 117,600 people.
However, it needs to be mentioned that this discrepancy is partially caused by the differences in the business models of the two companies, i.e. Alibaba not owning warehouses, etc.
Who is richer, Amazon or Alibaba?
(Stock News) (Ecommerce DB) (Yahoo Finance)
Although revenue numbers show that Amazon made $280.52 billion in 2019, while Alibaba made ‘only’ $72 billion, the gross profit margin favors the Chinese company (44.5% vs 40.3%).
When compared to the previous year’s revenues of $232 billion for Amazon and $53 billion for Alibaba, we can see that the latter has recorded a faster rate of growth, despite the gap in the revenues growing larger in favor of Amazon.
Bottom Line
These Alibaba statistics reveal the truth—the Chinese giant is slowly but surely turning into a world leader owing to a history of well-thought-out decisions and dedication to technological development. Alibaba Group’s agile approach helps them easily navigate the challenges of the changing market.
