Alibaba’s Jack Ma meets Trump; says focus will be on small businesses

New York, Jan 10 (KNN) Jack Ma, the Executive Chairman of global e-commerce giant Alibaba, met US President elect Donald Trump today to discuss bringing one million small businesses from US into its platform to sell to Chinese consumers over the next five years.

According to a media report quoting Alibaba spokesman, “Alibaba Executive Chairman Jack Ma met US President-elect Donald Trump on Monday and laid out the Chinese e-commerce giant's new plan to bring one million small US businesses onto its platform to sell to Chinese consumers over the next five years.”

Alibaba Group Holding Ltd expects the initiative to create one million US jobs as each company adds a position, company spokesman Bob Christie has said, according to the media report.

Post meeting at the Trump Tower, the president-elect told reporters they had a "great meeting" and would do great things together. Ma called Trump "smart" and "open-minded."

Ma said that Alibaba's expansion would focus on products like garments, wine and fruits, with a special focus on trade between the American midwest and southeast Asia.

"We're focused on small business," Ma told reporters. "We specifically talked about ... supporting 1 million small businesses, especially in the Midwest of America. Small businesses on the platform selling products — agriculture products and America

Ma said the small businesses could tap the Chinese market directly through Alibaba, whose Tmall online shopping platform offers virtual store fronts and payment portals to merchants.