Alibaba to open Australian headquarters

By

Benjamin Fitzgerald

Published
Jul 19, 2016

Chinese internet giant Alibaba has revealed plans to expand in Australia, opening a local office in Melbourne at the end of the year.

According to the Australian Financial Review, the move is part of Alibaba's long-term global domination, to connect two billion consumers with millions of merchants around the world.

The $US200 billion company's global president Michael Evans is Australia and New Zealand this week to discuss his company's efforts. Evans told AFR that Australia is a "huge part" of the company's globalisation effort, and detailed a four-pronged strategy to build out its e-commerce, online payments, logistics and cloud-computing businesses in this country, reported the newspaper.

Evans will visit Sydney, Melbourne, Auckland and Wellington to educate companies on using Alibaba Group’s various platforms as a gateway to China and other international markets.

Ahead of meetings with key suppliers, Evans spoke with local media and made light of concerns over imminent changes to e-commerce regulations inside China. He also dismissed concerns about the health of the Chinese economy.

"I think the Chinese economy is doing much better than most people think," he told AFR.

"There are lots and lots of challenges in China, particularly from a financial perspective. But I see those as manageable."
"China is one of the few bright spots in the global economy. People say it is growing slowly, I'm very happy with 6.7 per cent."

Once in Australia, local operations will be lead by Maggie Zhou, managing director; John O ‘Loghlen, business development director; and James Hudson, director of corporate affairs and marketing.

There are currently 1300 Australian brands on Alibaba's Tmall and Tmall Global, 80 per cent of which entered China for the first time through these platforms.