KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia -- (BUSINESS WIRE) --

Alibaba Group opened its national office in Malaysia today, marking a new chapter in the company’s deepening strategic cooperation with Malaysia, which is the first eWTP hub outside of China.

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Located in the heart of Kuala Lumpur at The Vertical Bangsar South, the new office signifies Alibaba Group’s continued endeavour to bolster the technology capability of Malaysian SMEs and young entrepreneurs, provide support and platforms to assist them to drive exports, as well as offering extensive training programs to help them take advantage of digital innovations and trade opportunities.

“Alibaba’s focus is on three areas when we partner with Malaysia as well as other countries – to digitize our local partners and empower small businesses and young people to go global. Over the past 30 years, only large corporations have benefited from globalisation. Imagine if we can support 60 million small business around the world; this is Alibaba’s vision of an inclusive and sustainable economy,” said Mr. Ma at the Alibaba office opening ceremony in Kuala Lumpur.

“Working closely with the Malaysian government, we will support and empower as many small businesses and young people as possible to use technology to become local kings and benefit from globalisation. This is the beginning of our story in Malaysia and I think Alibaba’s story will be long and we will make this story together,” he added.

Serving as a ‘one-stop solution centre’ for local businesses, the country office is designed to engage with existing local partners, help Malaysian businesses identify global cross-border trade opportunities, as well as to support the country’s technology innovation through cloud computing services.

“I would like to congratulate Alibaba for the opening of its national office in Malaysia. We consider this a shining symbol of China-Malaysia friendship that is based on mutual respect and benefits that augurs well for the cooperation on the part of governments, businesses and people from both countries. We look forward to the opportunities this partnership will bring to Malaysian SMEs and I am confident that the eWTP together with the Digital Free Trade Zone (DFTZ), will encourage more Malaysian SMEs to participate in ecommerce and increase their exports to other countries in Asia and beyond.” said Minister of Finance Malaysia, Yang Berhormat Lim Guan Eng, told guests at the ceremony.

“China and Malaysia have enjoyed a profound friendship and flourishing trade over the centuries. The robust numbers we see about our bilateral trade proves the strength of our economic relations. The launch of Alibaba’s Malaysia office is yet another step to boost a mutually beneficial cooperation between China and Malaysia,” said Mr. Bai Tian, China’s Ambassador to Malaysia, at the ceremony.

In November last year, Alibaba successfully launched its first international eHub in Malaysia under the eWTP initiative, with an emphasis on facilitating exports for Malaysian SMEs and creating the infrastructure to support global trade with services encompassing e-commerce, logistics, cloud computing, mobile payment and talent training.

Since then, various initiatives have been undertaken by Alibaba Group in Malaysia in order to build inclusive and innovative global trading technology infrastructure for local SMEs, including the establishment of Alibaba’s first regional e-fulfilment hub in the KLIA Aeropolis DFTZ Park and the establishment of Alibaba Cloud’s internet data centre in Malaysia - Malaysia’s first global public cloud platform.

Announce launch of ‘Malaysia Week’ in China

During the opening ceremony, the Company also announced the launch of ‘Malaysia Week’, a special online promotion initiative that seeks to attract Chinese consumers to buy all-things Malaysian from the 6^th to the 12^th of July 2018. The Malaysia Week campaign is set to showcase an array of ‘Must-see’, ‘Must-eat’, and ‘Must-experience’ Malaysian products and tourism across Alibaba’s platforms.

“Malaysia Week is the first time Alibaba has promoted one country for an entire week. This symbolizes our commitment to introduce and promote Malaysian products, services, culture and tourism in China. We hope to continue to host promotional activities such as this in the long term to enable local Malaysian businesses expand their international exports in China and the rest of the world,” Mr. Ma said.

More than 50 Malaysian brands, featuring a wide range of product categories, will be showcased, in addition to a whole host of exciting promotional activities to be launched during the period.

‘Malaysia week’ is the result of fruitful discussions between Alibaba Group and Malaysia since the launch of eWTP. Other milestones in the development of Alibaba Group’s support for Malaysia’s digital economy, include:

Logistics

• Commenced construction of a smart e-fulfilment hub in Kuala Lumpur under a Cainiao-MAHB joint venture to enable speedy storage, fulfilment, customs clearance and warehousing operations.

Cloud computing

• Opened a local internet data center to provide Malaysian enterprises a local choice to build their businesses and run their applications on powerful, reliable and secure world-class global cloud platform.

Training

• Trained thousands of individuals, entrepreneurs and cloud computing professionals under various programs in conjunction with leading Malaysian universities and government agencies to support Malaysia’s sustainable e-commerce development.

E-commerce

• Launched Malaysia Pavilion on Alibaba.com to promote quality Malaysian products to global buyers.
• Established a one-stop platform to provide export facilitation with services ranging from marketing and customs clearance, to streamlined permit application procedures and tax declaration and more.
• Hosted March Expo with MDEC and MATRADE to connect Malaysian wholesalers with global sales opportunities.
• Held “Access to China Consumers” seminar to help Malaysian exporters enter the China market with participation of more than 500 Malaysian merchants.
• Announced the launch of Malaysia Week in July 2018 to promote a broad range of Malaysian products and services to China’s consumers.

About Alibaba Group

Alibaba Group’s mission is to make it easy to do business anywhere. The company aims to build the future infrastructure of commerce. It envisions that its customers will meet, work and live at Alibaba, and that it will be a company that lasts at least 102 years.

About Electronic World Trade Platform (eWTP)

The Electronic World Trade Platform (eWTP) initiative’s goal is to build a more inclusive and innovative global trading platform for SMEs, young people and consumers. The eWTP was proposed by Jack Ma in 2016 and was accepted as a major policy recommendation of the Business 20 (B20) and officially included in the 2016 G20 Leaders’ Communique.

Alibaba Group’s first eWTP hub outside of China has gone live in Malaysia. The milestone follows Alibaba’s partnership with the Malaysian Digital Economy Corporation (MDEC) to work jointly to enable Malaysian small and medium-sized enterprises to benefit from global trade.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20180618005591/en/

CONTACT:

Alibaba Group
Cathy Yan, +852 90125806
cathy.yan@alibaba-inc.com
or
Alibaba Group
Rico Ngai, +852 97259600
rico.ngai@alibaba-inc.com

Left to Right: Ambassador Bai Tian, China Ambassador to Malaysia, Jack Ma, Executive Chairman and Founder of Alibaba Group, YB Lim Guan Eng, Finance Minister of Malaysia, Gobind Singh Deo, Minister of Communication & Multimedia (Photo: Business Wire)