In just a decade and half Jack Ma, a man from modest beginnings who started out as an English teacher, founded and built Alibaba into one of the world’s largest companies, an e-commerce empire on which hundreds of millions of Chinese consumers depend. Alibaba’s $25 billion IPO in 2014 was the largest global IPO ever. A Rockefeller of his age who is courted by CEOs and Presidents around the world, Jack is an icon for China’s booming private sector and the gatekeeper to hundreds of millions of middle class consumers.

Duncan Clark first met Jack in 1999 in the small apartment where Jack founded Alibaba. Granted unprecedented access to a wealth of new material including exclusive interviews, Clark draws on his own experience as an early advisor to Alibaba and two decades in China chronicling the Internet’s impact on the country to create an authoritative, compelling narrative account of Alibaba’s rise.

How did Jack overcome his humble origins and early failures to achieve massive success with Alibaba? How did he outsmart rival entrepreneurs from China and Silicon Valley? Can Alibaba maintain its 80% market share? As it forges ahead into finance and entertainment, are there limits to Alibaba’s ambitions? How does the Chinese government view its rise? Will Alibaba expand further overseas, including in the U.S.?

Clark tells Alibaba’s tale in the context of China’s momentous economic and social changes, illuminating an unlikely corporate titan as never before.

鄧肯•剋拉剋（Duncan Clark），畢業於倫敦政治經濟學院，先後作為投資銀行傢於倫敦和香港的摩根士丹利分部工作4年。1994年他在北京創立瞭BDA公司，目前擔任董事長一職。BDA為投資者提供專業的谘詢服務，特彆專注於中國的科技及消費者領域，在北京的專業員工超過100人。鄧肯在阿裏巴巴早期曾為其提供谘詢服務，此外他還是英國政府在中國數字經濟方麵的顧問。由於他在英國在華貿易和投資方麵所做齣的傑齣貢獻，鄧肯於2013年被授予大英帝國官佐勛章。他還曾擔任中國英國商會主席。2010～2012年，鄧肯在斯坦福大學擔任訪問學者，並於2010年聯閤創建瞭“China 2.0”項目。

鄧肯是許多科技企業的早期投資人，如App Annie、Student.com以及Radish Fiction。他目前還在一些機構的顧問委員會中任職，其中包括總部位於日內瓦的Pictet & Cie銀行旗下的數字通信基金、杜絕非法野生動物交易的野生救援協會。鄧肯還是盤古銀行（中國）的獨立董事。鄧肯是經常活躍於眾多商業媒體的行業評論員，其中包括BBC、CNBC、CNN等。同時，他也是中國互聯網和企業創業領域方麵所公認的專傢。