阿
里巴巴(Alibaba.com)今年前两个季度实现了强劲的收益，不过在保持用户数量增长和扩大用户使用增值服务方面却面临着持续的挑战。阿里巴巴说，预计今年下半年中国出口增长将放缓，进而可能会影响使用阿里巴巴网站的众多中国中小出口商的前景。阿里巴巴是电子商务公司阿里巴巴集团(Alibaba Group)香港上市子公司，为中外企业提供在线目录以为它们的产品找到买家，收入大部分来自出口商。阿里巴巴运营着数个B2B电子商务网站。
Bloomberg News
阿里巴巴首席执行长卫哲
卫哲出生于中国大陆，拥有伦敦商学院(London Business School) EMBA学位。他此前曾任百安居中国(B&Q China)总裁。百安居中国是家装零售商Kingfisher PLC的子公司。卫哲日前接受了《华尔街日报》（以下简称WSJ）记者弗莱彻(Owen Fletcher)的专访，分享了他的战略。
采访节录如下：
WSJ：你如何定义B2B2C模式？
卫哲：第一个B代表的是厂家或供应商，第二个B代表商家，C则代表消费者。这是从厂家供应商通过网络到在线商家，在线商家通过在线零售为上网购物的消费者提供服务。
WSJ：在扩张海外业务方面，你在寻求何种合作方式？
卫哲：首先，我想是B2B2C模式的合作。我们也在积极期待在交易会、保险、银行业、物流和对中小企业来说任何重要的贸易服务领域建立更多的合作关系。如果在接下来的几个季度，我们不断宣布与我提到的这些领域的公司建立战略合作关系，你不要感到吃惊。
对B2B2C来说，合作将主要是在如何增强全球速卖通方面。我们有90%的买家在网上买东西，在网络之外卖出。有90%的在线商家在网上销售产品，不过货源来自网络之外。很少有人真的享受完全的在线供货和零售。正因为如此，我们在寻求B2B2C在线模式，以便实现从采购到零售的全过程。
WSJ：你认为未来几个季度你们的战略交易包括收购吗？
卫哲：绝对包括收购。首要任务将是进一步增强全球速卖通。
WSJ：在你们的计划中，4月份推出的全球速卖通起着怎样的增长推动作用？
卫哲：目前它才新生三个月。我们一直在改善支付，通过与UPS等公司合作来改善物流，并通过收购Vendio等公司来争取买方。我们将继续做这三样事情。这是背后1亿美元投资中的一部分。我们相信，用两三年的时间，全球速卖通就会成为一个非常重要的利润和收入来源。
WSJ：你在4月份说，全球速卖通将接受PayPal支付。你是否打算还跟其他支付公司合作？
卫哲：是的。要是我们不接受你的支付而造成你不能在AliExpress.com上面采购，那是没道理的。所以你能够想象的一切支付方式，我们都会扫清障碍。
WSJ：未来几年，阿里巴巴会主要瞄准哪些国家来实现进一步的增长？
卫哲：美国、日本和印度，这是最重要的三个国家。而未来三年，我们在这三个国家实际上还是在进行投资，而不是收获收入或利润。
WSJ：在美国实现增长会遇到什么挑战？
卫哲：美国这个国家一直是非常以购买为中心的。我们在美国有超过200万注册用户，但其中只有不到5%注册为卖家。
相比之下，英国有几十万用户，但注册为卖方的用户在14%以上。我们应该鼓励更多的美国小企业发挥创业精神，更多地拿到网上去销售，更多地卖到美国市场以外。
WSJ：你觉得最近欧美出口市场有没有走软？
卫哲：实际上美国不及多数人认为的乐观，而欧洲市场不及多数人认为的悲观。
原因在于基本的消费能力。美国失业率是一个非常大的问题，而你看多数欧洲国家，失业了也没关系。他们多年失业率超过双位数。另外，主权债务问题是非常有限的，可以控制。
WSJ：所以你觉得中国出口商没有因为欧元区债务危机而受到多大冲击？
卫哲：没有。欧洲国家的问题很大，如果你看国内生产总值和整个欧元区的比重，其实是非常小的。中国对这些国家的出口也一样，比例非常小。甚至就是这点很小的比例，我们也没有看到出现大幅下降。
WSJ：增值服务作为增长引擎具有怎样的重要性？
卫哲：这项业务的收入增长应该有两大引擎：会员费和增值服务。三年前，增值服务在我们的收入中占比不足10%，两年前在15%左右。
现在在国际市场占25%，中国市场占20%。而我们预计，用户渗透率每年5%的增长是有可能的。增值服务背后的利润率远高于会员费，因为不管有没有增值服务，为一家客户提供服务的成本都是一样的。
OWEN FLETCHER
（更新完成）
China-based Alibaba.com, which runs several websites for commerce between businesses, posted strong financial results for the first two quarters this year, but it faces the continuing challenges of keeping up subscriber growth and expanding customers' use of its value-added services. Alibaba has said it expects slower export growth in China in the second half this year, which could crimp prospects for the many small- and medium-size Chinese exporters that use its websites. Alibaba.com, the Hong Kong-listed unit of e-commerce company Alibaba Group, provides online listings for Chinese and foreign companies to find buyers for their products and derives most of its revenue from exporters.
Chief Executive David Wei says another source of growth will be AliExpress, a U.S.-focused online wholesale platform that is geared for smaller orders and in which Alibaba has said it plans to invest $100 million. As part of that investment, Alibaba has already made its first U.S. acquisition by buying Vendio Services, which helps merchants sell goods on sites such as Amazon.com Inc. and eBay Inc. Alibaba has strived to attract more users with lower membership prices and is in the middle of a three-year plan to boost customer numbers the first year, revenue this year and margins next year.
Mr. Wei was born in mainland China and holds an advanced degree from the London Business School. He has previously served as president of B&Q China, a subsidiary of home-improvement retailer Kingfisher PLC. Mr. Wei shared his strategy in an interview with Owen Fletcher. Edited excerpts:
WSJ: Could you define B2B2C, the business-to-business-to-consumer model?
Mr. Wei: The first B represents a factory, or a supplier. The second B is the merchants, the C is consumer. So it's from factory supplier, online to the online merchants, and the online merchants [going] through online retail to serve consumers shopping online.
WSJ: What types of partnerships are you looking at to keep expanding outside China?
Mr. Wei: First, I think, partnerships regarding the [business-to-business-to-consumer] model. We are also actually looking forward to building more partnerships in areas like trade shows, insurance, banking, logistics, and any trade services which are important to our small and medium businesses. So you won't be surprised in the next few quarters, [if] we keep announcing strategic partnerships with the companies in the areas I mentioned.
[For B2B2C,] the partnerships will be focused on how we boost AliExpress.com. Ninety percent of our buyers buy products online and sell offline. Ninety percent of online merchants sell their products online, but source their products offline. Very few people actually really enjoy full online sourcing and retail. So that's why we are looking to the B2B2C online model, to enable [the full process] from procurement to retail.
WSJ: Do you expect your strategic deals in the next few quarters to include acquisitions?
Mr. Wei: Definitely. The priority will be to further boost AliExpress.
WSJ: How does AliExpress, which you launched in April, fit into your plans as a growth driver?
Mr. Wei: It's a three-month old baby at the moment. We have been improving the payments, we have been improving the logistics by partnering with companies like UPS, we have been securing the buy-side by buying companies like Vendio. We will continue to do these three things. That's part of the $100 million investment behind it. We believe in two to three years' time [AliExpress] will become a very important margin and revenue contribution.
WSJ: In April you said you would accept payments from PayPal on AliExpress. Are you looking to add other payment partners too?
Mr. Wei: Yes. There should not be any reason that you cannot source from AliExpress.com because we don't accept your payment. So anything you can imagine, any payment, we will eliminate the barrier.
WSJ: Which countries is Alibaba targeting most in the next few years for further growth?
Mr. Wei: [The] U.S., Japan and India, these are the three top priorities. And [for] the next three years actually we still see [ourselves] investing in the three countries instead of harvesting the revenue or profit.
WSJ: What are the challenges to growth in the U.S.?
Mr. Wei: The U.S. is a country which has been very buying-centric. We have over two million registered users in [the] U.S. but less than 5% of them register as sellers.
In comparison the U.K. [has] several hundred thousand users but more than 14% [are] registered as sellers . We should encourage more U.S. small businesses to build up entrepreneurship and sell more online, sell more outside the US.
WSJ: Have you seen any recent weakening in the U.S. and European export markets?
Mr. Wei: Actually [the] U.S., as always, is less optimistic than most people think, and the European market is less pessimistic than most people think.
The reason is the basic consumption power. In the U.S. unemployment is a very, very big issue. While if you look at most European countries, if you get unemployed, no problem. They have been living with double-digit unemployment for many years. Also the sovereign debt issue is very limited and can be controlled.
WSJ: So you haven't seen much impact on Chinese exporters from the euro-zone debt crisis?
Mr. Wei: No. The European countries in deep trouble, actually, if you look at the [gross domestic product] and the percentage of the whole euro zone, they're very small. And the same with exports from China to these countries, [they] are a very small percentage. Even in that small percentage, we didn't see a big drop.
WSJ: How important are value-added services as a growth driver?
Mr. Wei: There should be two drivers for the revenue growth for the business: membership fees and value-added services. Three years ago, VAS represented single-digit [percentages] of our revenue, and two years ago in the mid-teens.
Now it's 25% for the international marketplace and 20% for the China marketplace. And we anticipate 5% [user penetration] growth year-to-year is possible. The margin behind the value-added service is much better than the membership fee, because the cost to serve one customer is the same, with or without value added service.
OWEN FLETCHER
Chief Executive David Wei says another source of growth will be AliExpress, a U.S.-focused online wholesale platform that is geared for smaller orders and in which Alibaba has said it plans to invest $100 million. As part of that investment, Alibaba has already made its first U.S. acquisition by buying Vendio Services, which helps merchants sell goods on sites such as Amazon.com Inc. and eBay Inc. Alibaba has strived to attract more users with lower membership prices and is in the middle of a three-year plan to boost customer numbers the first year, revenue this year and margins next year.
Mr. Wei was born in mainland China and holds an advanced degree from the London Business School. He has previously served as president of B&Q China, a subsidiary of home-improvement retailer Kingfisher PLC. Mr. Wei shared his strategy in an interview with Owen Fletcher. Edited excerpts:
WSJ: Could you define B2B2C, the business-to-business-to-consumer model?
Mr. Wei: The first B represents a factory, or a supplier. The second B is the merchants, the C is consumer. So it's from factory supplier, online to the online merchants, and the online merchants [going] through online retail to serve consumers shopping online.
WSJ: What types of partnerships are you looking at to keep expanding outside China?
Mr. Wei: First, I think, partnerships regarding the [business-to-business-to-consumer] model. We are also actually looking forward to building more partnerships in areas like trade shows, insurance, banking, logistics, and any trade services which are important to our small and medium businesses. So you won't be surprised in the next few quarters, [if] we keep announcing strategic partnerships with the companies in the areas I mentioned.
[For B2B2C,] the partnerships will be focused on how we boost AliExpress.com. Ninety percent of our buyers buy products online and sell offline. Ninety percent of online merchants sell their products online, but source their products offline. Very few people actually really enjoy full online sourcing and retail. So that's why we are looking to the B2B2C online model, to enable [the full process] from procurement to retail.
WSJ: Do you expect your strategic deals in the next few quarters to include acquisitions?
Mr. Wei: Definitely. The priority will be to further boost AliExpress.
WSJ: How does AliExpress, which you launched in April, fit into your plans as a growth driver?
Mr. Wei: It's a three-month old baby at the moment. We have been improving the payments, we have been improving the logistics by partnering with companies like UPS, we have been securing the buy-side by buying companies like Vendio. We will continue to do these three things. That's part of the $100 million investment behind it. We believe in two to three years' time [AliExpress] will become a very important margin and revenue contribution.
WSJ: In April you said you would accept payments from PayPal on AliExpress. Are you looking to add other payment partners too?
Mr. Wei: Yes. There should not be any reason that you cannot source from AliExpress.com because we don't accept your payment. So anything you can imagine, any payment, we will eliminate the barrier.
WSJ: Which countries is Alibaba targeting most in the next few years for further growth?
Mr. Wei: [The] U.S., Japan and India, these are the three top priorities. And [for] the next three years actually we still see [ourselves] investing in the three countries instead of harvesting the revenue or profit.
WSJ: What are the challenges to growth in the U.S.?
Mr. Wei: The U.S. is a country which has been very buying-centric. We have over two million registered users in [the] U.S. but less than 5% of them register as sellers.
In comparison the U.K. [has] several hundred thousand users but more than 14% [are] registered as sellers . We should encourage more U.S. small businesses to build up entrepreneurship and sell more online, sell more outside the US.
WSJ: Have you seen any recent weakening in the U.S. and European export markets?
Mr. Wei: Actually [the] U.S., as always, is less optimistic than most people think, and the European market is less pessimistic than most people think.
The reason is the basic consumption power. In the U.S. unemployment is a very, very big issue. While if you look at most European countries, if you get unemployed, no problem. They have been living with double-digit unemployment for many years. Also the sovereign debt issue is very limited and can be controlled.
WSJ: So you haven't seen much impact on Chinese exporters from the euro-zone debt crisis?
Mr. Wei: No. The European countries in deep trouble, actually, if you look at the [gross domestic product] and the percentage of the whole euro zone, they're very small. And the same with exports from China to these countries, [they] are a very small percentage. Even in that small percentage, we didn't see a big drop.
WSJ: How important are value-added services as a growth driver?
Mr. Wei: There should be two drivers for the revenue growth for the business: membership fees and value-added services. Three years ago, VAS represented single-digit [percentages] of our revenue, and two years ago in the mid-teens.
Now it's 25% for the international marketplace and 20% for the China marketplace. And we anticipate 5% [user penetration] growth year-to-year is possible. The margin behind the value-added service is much better than the membership fee, because the cost to serve one customer is the same, with or without value added service.
OWEN FLETCHER
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