阿里巴巴增长战略不明

    今后几年，阿里巴巴（Alibaba）必须保持飞速增长，以回馈投资者，对于这一点，没人会提出异议，阿里巴巴董事长马云更不会有异议。但问题在于，要实现其承诺的收入和利润快速增长，阿里巴巴应该把财力和人力集中在哪里？

    要应对这项挑战，需要有高度集中的增长战略。而眼下，阿里巴巴的扩张计划可谓一团乱麻。

    阿里巴巴长期以来的目标是主导本土市场，然而，最近该公司又决心在全球市场上大展宏图，这两项使命之间的偏差令投资者困惑。他们也确实应该感到困惑。在9月5日提交的招股说明书里，电子商务巨头阿里巴巴几乎没有提到海外扩张计划。相反，招股书大谈特谈阿里巴巴在国内占据主导地位，并且其定位绝佳，可从数字购物增长浪潮中获益良多。数字购物浪潮可谓史上一大消费趋势。

    为说明这一点，招股书列举了一系列令人咋舌的数据，这也是招股书的亮点之一。这些数据包括：阿里巴巴一年处理的线上订单额高达2980亿美元；在蓬勃发展的移动购物领域，阿里巴巴控制着86%的市场份额。简单来说，这份长达665页的招股书可以用一句话来概括，那就是“中国是我们的未来”。

    然而，在最近的IPO路演上，马云一直在宣扬另一种截然不同的战略。9月15日，他在香港对记者表示，阿里巴巴意欲在美国和欧洲大展拳脚。随后，他又在旧金山盛赞阿里巴巴在俄罗斯和巴西发展前景广阔。

    对此，服务企业用户的全球贸易数据供应商Panjiva联合创始人兼首席执行官乔希•格林表示：“他们的战略不清晰。招股书中大书特书在中国的机会，而马云现在讲的却是全球发展大计。现在阿里巴巴如日中天，这样做也许没问题。但中期而言，如果投资战略前后不一，将招来投资者警惕的目光。”

    格林认为，阿里巴巴应该巩固在中国的主导地位。他表示：“他们从事的是网络业务，在本土吸引的消费者越多，随之而来的商户就越多，而新的产品反过来又会吸引更多消费者，用户群的增长会呈现相辅相成之势。”

    投资阿里巴巴就相当于把宝全押在中国身上，而明天的中国也许不会像过去十年那样风光无限，特别是考虑到近来中国经济增长放缓、房产价格和建设规模存在螺旋下跌风险。不过，在自己已经是龙头的领域进一步做强合情合理。

    让人意外的是，虽然嘴上不那么说，但阿里巴巴的行动表明，该公司对中国电商发展奇迹的未来并不是特别有信心。阿里巴巴并没有把注意力完全放在数字领域，而是收购了许多和电商无关的业务，包括电影公司、家电制造商和足球俱乐部。

    格林说：“我想问问阿里巴巴，他们对中国的态度是乐观还是悲观。如果乐观，他们就应该利用自己的领先地位，竭尽全力发挥主导优势。”

    No one disputes that to reward investors, Alibaba must keep growing at tremendous speed in the years to come, least of all its chairman Jack Ma. The question is, where will Alibaba concentrate its investments and manpower to generate the fast-rising revenues and profits it’s promising?

    That challenge will require a highly focused growth strategy. Right now, Alibaba’s plans for expansion are a muddle.

    Investors are confused—or if they’re not, they should be—by the dissonance between Alibaba’s long-standing goal of dominating its home market and its newfound mission to become a major force around the globe. In its most recent IPO prospectus, filed on September 5, the e-commerce phenomenon makes little mention of plans to expand outside its home market. Instead, it touts Alibaba’s commanding position in China and its ideal positioning to ride the growth wave in digital shopping, which is one of the great consumer trends in history.

    To make its point, the prospectus is famously packed with staggering statistics, among them that Alibaba handles $298 billion a year in online retail orders and controls 86% of the mushrooming mobile marketplace. Put simply, you could summarize the 665-page prospectus in four words, “China is our future.”

    But on its recent IPO roadshow, Ma has been selling a totally different strategy. On September 15 in Hong Kong, Ma told reporters that Alibaba harbors big growth ambitions in the U.S. and Europe. And later in San Francisco, he lauded Alibaba’s prospects in Russia and Brazil.

    “It’s not clear what their strategy is,” says Josh Green, co-founder and CEO of Panjiva, a firm that provides global trade data to corporate customers. “The prospectus is all about opportunities in China, and Ma is now talking about his global ambitions. It may be all right for now because they’re doing so well, but in the medium-term, investors will look with a wary eye on any investment that doesn’t have a coherent strategy.”

    Green believes that Alibaba ought to deepen its dominance in China. “They’re in a network business,” he says. “The more customers they attract at home, the more businesses follow, then more customers want the new products, and the customer base grows in a mutually reinforcing cycle.”

    Investing in Alibaba constitutes a bet on a single nation, and the China of tomorrow may not prove the juggernaut of the past decade, particularly given the recent news of its slowing growth rate and the threat of a downward spiral in real estate prices and construction. Still, getting stronger in the areas in which you’re already a leader makes sense.

    Surprisingly, Alibaba—by its action, rather than its words—isn’t showing a lot of confidence in the next phase of China’s e-commerce miracle. Rather than concentrating solely on digital, it is buying lots of unrelated businesses, including a movie studio, an appliance manufacturer, and a soccer team.

    “I’d like to ask Alibaba if they’re bullish or bearish on China,” asks Green. “If they’re bullish, they’d use their poll position to do everything to exploit their dominance.”