阿里巴巴纪录片揭示的4个要点

    由雅虎（Yahoo）部分持股、估值1,500亿美元的中国电子商务巨头阿里巴巴（Alibaba,）将于未来数月在纽交所上市（确切日期待定）。其首次公开募股（IPO）预计将募集200多亿美元，有可能成为美国甚至全球交易所史上规模最大的IPO。阿里巴巴前副总裁、美国人波特•埃里斯曼过去几年一直忙于制作纪录片《扬子江大鳄》（Crocodile in the Yangtze），它记录了阿里巴巴自15年前由马云创立以来的发展历程。这部影片已于最近发布，《财富》选取了其中最惊人的一些场景，摘录如下。

    Alibaba, the Chinese e-commerce giant partially owned by Yahoo and valued at $150 billion, is aiming for an initial public offering on the New York Stock Exchange sometime in the next few months (the exact date has yet to be determined). Expected to raise more than $20 billion, the IPO could be the biggest yet on a U.S. exchange and potentially in world history. A recently released documentary by Alibaba’s former vice president Porter Erisman, an American who has spent the past several years working on the film, depicts the company’s journey since it was founded by Jack Ma 15 years ago. Here are some of the most surprising takeaways from “Crocodile in the Yangtze.”

    1. 阿里巴巴诞生于艰苦的工作环境中

    类似于其他科技创业公司[如苹果（Apple）和Facebook]，阿里巴巴最初是在杭州的一个小公寓内创立的，那是马云自己的家。曾是英语老师的他为了实现创业梦想而辞去了工作。他经历过几次失败的创业，包括灵感源于电话簿的“中国黄页”网站。此后，马云决定追随90年代末席卷美国的电子商务大潮。1999年，马云和17位朋友挤在他的公寓内创立了阿里巴巴，他们取这个名字是希望小企业通过“芝麻开门！”这个咒语打开全球贸易之门，埃里斯曼在影片中叙述道。17位联合创始人坐在马云周围的椅子和沙发上倾听他的励志演讲。“我们要学习硅谷的勤奋精神”，马云说。这其实就是在说希望自己的员工在工作中投入比大多数人更多的时间。“如果我们都是抱着朝八晚五的想法，那还是趁早走人去做别的事吧。”这个团队在马云的公寓内埋头苦干了7个月，以避开竞争对手的注意并降低成本。直到公司得到了高盛（Goldman Sachs）和日本软银（SoftBank）的投资之后，阿里巴巴才于2000年正式公开亮相。  

    1. Alibaba was born amid grueling working conditions

    Similar to tech start-ups like Apple and Facebook, Alibaba started out in a tiny apartment in Hangzhou that belonged to Jack Ma, a former English teacher who quit his job to follow dreams of entrepreneurship. After a few failed business ventures, including a phone book-inspired “China Pages” website, Ma decided to pursue the e-commerce trend that was sweeping America in the late '90s. In 1999, Ma and 17 friends crowded into his apartment and built Alibaba.com, a name they hoped would draw small businesses “to say ‘Open Sesame!’ to global trade,” Erisman narrates in the film. Sitting on chairs and couches around Ma, the 17 co-founders are shown listening to Ma’s motivational speeches. “We need to learn the hardworking spirit of the Silicon Valley,” Ma explains, implying that he expected staff to work longer days than most people. “If we have that kind of 8 am to 5 pm spirit, then we should just go and do something else.” The team plugged away in Ma’s apartment for seven months, trying to stay off competitors’ radar and reduce costs, until new investments from Goldman Sachs and SoftBank, a Japanese telecom company, led Alibaba to organize a public launch in 2000.