Alibaba Group Holding Limited BABA shares have plunged over 46% in New York since the year began but could the appointment of Trudy Dai, a founding member of the company, as in charge of domestic e-commerce be a game-changer?
Who Is Turdy Shan Dai? Dai, a bachelor’s degree holder from Hangzhou Institute of Electrical Engineering joined Alibaba in 1999 and her career has spanned across Alibaba.com, 1688.com, AliExpress, Taobao among others.
Dai takes over as the chief of domestic e-commerce from Jiang Fan next month. Jiang will head the company's international e-commerce operations — made up of consumer and wholesale business units such as AliExpress and Lazada.
Alibaba founder Jack Ma is the former English teacher of Dai, reported Nikkei Asia.
See Also: How To Buy Alibaba (BABA) Stock
Why Dai Is So Important? An Alibaba source told Nikkei Asia that while Dai has mainly been involved in human resources and business-to-business operations and has had little experience in digital retailing, she can be counted upon to “rebuild weakened organizations and foster talent.”
“Dai has a calm personality, and she is well-trusted by those around her,” the Nikkei Source revealed.
Ma’s push to restore a founding member in charge of Chinese e-commerce is fueling speculation that he could be losing confidence in Alibaba CEO Daniel Zhang.
Ma, who is Alibaba’s single largest individual shareholder, is believed to have played a role in Dai’s appointment.
“Ma may have decided that Zhang alone will not be able to put the company back on track,” the unnamed source told Nikkei Asia.
Dai’s Challenges Are Significant: Alibaba’s second-quarter earnings per share were $1.74, compared to an estimate of $1.93. Consumer sales fell to $26.7 billion from $27.92 billion in the prior quarter.
A slew of factors such as macroeconomic weakness, adverse regulatory environment, and increased competition have affected the company’s fortunes in recent days.
Alibaba’s revenue is expected to grow by between 20% and 23% for the year ending March 2022, which is the slowest pace on record.
The coming exit of Maggie Wu as CFO in April 2022 is being attributed by some market watchers to their failure to chart a clear path to growth, as per Nikkei Asia.
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