Jack Ma’s post retirement plans consist of philanthropy, teaching

Co-founder of Alibaba, Jack Ma, who is also one of the richest men in China has decided to step down as the executive chairman of Alibaba Group, according to the New York Times. Ma founded Alibaba group in 1999 and is the backbone to make it one of the world’s biggest e-commerce organisations. Ma is set to unveil his succession strategy on his 54th birth anniversary, as per South China Morning Post, a Hong Kong daily owned by Alibaba.

“I sat down with our senior executives 10 years ago and asked what Alibaba would do without me. I’m very proud that Alibaba now has the structure, corporate culture, governance and system for grooming talent that allows me to step away without causing disruption,” Ma told the South China Morning Post. 

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Alibaba group’s market value is more than $400 billion and includes film production, online selling, and cloud computing.

However, Jack Ma in an interview with the Times said his retirement would not be the end of an era but “the beginning of an era”.

Ma will turn 54 on Monday told Bloomberg TV that he wants to create a personal foundation like Bill Gates.

"There's a lot of things I can learn from Bill Gates," he said.

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CEO of Alibaba, Ma wants to go back to teaching as he thinks he can do much better in that field rather than being the CEO of Alibaba.

"I can never be as rich, but one thing I can do better is to retire earlier. I think someday, and soon, I'll go back to teaching. This is something I think I can do much better than being CEO of Alibaba."

“I was not considered a good student but I improved, we keep on learning all the time. So I want to devote most my time to this,” Ma added. 

Ma, unlike his fellow tech founders, lacks an engineering background and spends his maximum time with his philanthropic endeavours. 

Ma started his professional life as an English teacher in an university of Hangzhou, China and co-founded Alibaba from his flat with a group of friends.