Alibaba office building logo seen in Shanghai's Huangpu district on June 16, 2023.
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“The strong performance was driven by solid growth across all of AIDC's retail platforms, particularly its cross-border AliExpress Choice business,” the company said.
Meanwhile, the company's core e-commerce businesses, Taobao and Tmall Group, had sales of $18.1 billion, an increase of only 2% year-on-year.
“Next year, we will step up investment to improve the core experience of our users to drive Taobao and Tmall Group's growth and strengthen our market leadership. We will also strengthen our investments in the development of public cloud products. We will also focus resources on maintaining the strong growth momentum of our international commerce business,'' Alibaba Group CEO Eddie Wu said earlier this month.
The tightening of ships is likely aimed at strengthening the growth trajectory and reducing the risk of uncertainty in operating in multiple competitive markets…
Yinglan Tan
Founding Managing Partner of Insignia Ventures Partners
Despite AIDC's strong sales growth, losses also surged year-on-year, mainly due to “increased investment in businesses such as AliExpress' Choice and Trendyol's international operations, partially due to improved monetization.” “It was canceled out,” he said.
The quarterly results come after a series of management changes at Alibaba and its subsidiaries. Pakistani e-commerce platform Daraz replaced CEO Bjarke Mikkelsen on January 24th. James Dong, CEO of Southeast Asian e-commerce giant Lazada Group, has been named acting CEO of Daraz. The company said it is “committed to deeper integration with Daraz and our sister companies.”
In early January, Lazada implemented mass layoffs across Southeast Asia, affecting employees at all levels, including senior management. The layoffs will affect all sectors, including commercial, retail and marketing.
An Alibaba International official with knowledge of the matter told CNBC that Lazada's job cuts are aimed at “streamlining decision-making and increasing organizational and business efficiency.”
Insignia Tan, founding managing partner at Insignia Ventures Partners, said: “These latest management reforms stem from last year's Alibaba breakup and are primarily driven by the Chinese government, which has long put pressure on the tech giant. “This is a strategy to survive regulatory trends.”
“The nature of AIDC as a portfolio of diverse and individually complex businesses, from Daraz to Lazada, is also a key factor. is likely to be aimed at mitigating the risk of uncertainty in…'' Tan said.
Alibaba announced in March that it would split into six business units, paving the way for a separate stock listing. Zhang told investors that the move will make Alibaba's business “more agile, strengthen its business decision-making, and enable it to respond faster to market changes.”
“Keeping organizations agile and adaptable has always been a top priority for China's technology leaders. The rise of competitors and changes in the external environment have made this even more urgent.” Momentum Works said in the January report “Understanding''. This is the most fundamental change in Alibaba's history. ”
Reflecting the parent company's moves, Lazada's management team has also undergone considerable changes in recent years.
Mr. Dong was appointed CEO of Lazada Group from Mr. Chun-Li in June 2022 after being in charge of business operations in Thailand and Vietnam. Prior to that, Mr. Dong was the head of globalization strategy and corporate development at Alibaba Group, and the former CEO only once served as Mr. Zhang's business assistant.
In 2020, Lee took over the role from Pierre Poignant, who replaced Lucy Penn in December 2018, after just nine months in the role.
The e-commerce business that once made Alibaba so successful faces challenges from emerging competitors such as PDD, while consumption growth in China remains sluggish.
China-based PDD Holdings reported that its revenue nearly doubled in the third quarter, far outpacing Alibaba's 9% growth in the same period. PDD announced revenue of $9.44 billion for the quarter, an increase of 94% from $4.99 billion in the same quarter of 2022. Alibaba posted third-quarter sales of about $31 billion, up 9% from the same period last year.
Alibaba's Hong Kong-listed shares have fallen sharply from a record high of HK$309.4 ($39.59) on October 28, 2020, according to LSEG data. The stock price closed at HK$71.50 on Monday.
