Alibaba Group has announced a major management reshuffle aimed at spurring growth at a time when the Chinese economy is slowing.
The e-commerce giant announced that Eddie Wu, chairman of its e-commerce group, will succeed Daniel Zhang as CEO, according to a company statement.
“This is the right time for me to make a transition, given the importance of Alibaba Cloud Intelligence Group as it progresses towards a full spin-off,” Zhang said in a statement.
The change takes effect Sept. 10.
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Zhang will be CEO and chairman of Alibaba’s cloud computing unit, which has been approved to be spun off and is expected to be listed for trading within a year.
Alibaba’s current executive vice chairman, Joseph Tsai, is to succeed Zhang as chairman of the Alibaba Group.
Tsai owns the NBA’s Brooklyn Nets and helped to found Alibaba in the late 1990s.
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Zhang added: “I look forward to working closely with Joe and Eddie in the coming months to ensure a seamless transition.”
Zhang became Alibaba Group’s CEO in 2015 and succeeded Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma as chairman in 2019.
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Alibaba in March announced plans to reshape itself into six business divisions with plans to allow all but its core e-commerce business to raise outside capital and go public.
The six units will include Cloud Intelligence Group, Taobao Tmall Commerce Group, Local Services Group, Cainiao Smart Logistics Group, Global Digital Commerce Group and Digital Media and Entertainment Group.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.