Dr. Ming Zeng is the Chief Strategy Officer of Alibaba Group, the largest e-business company in Asia that offers business-to-business international trade, online retail and payment platforms, and data-centric cloud computing services. Dr. Zeng had been a strategy advisor for Alibaba group since 2002, before joining full time in 2006. He also served as the acting president of China Yahoo! from November 2006 to December 2007. Dr. Zeng has played an essential role in shaping the business strategies of Alibaba Group.

Between 2002-2006, Dr. Zeng was a Professor of Strategy at Cheung Kong Graduate School of Business, Beijing, China. Before that, he was a faculty member at INSEAD, France.

Dr. Zeng has conducted extensive research on e-commerce, growth strategies of Chinese companies, and how the emergence of Chinese competitors is changing global competition. His 2003 article “The Hidden Dragons”, which analyzed the globalization strategy of Chinese firms, is one of the most cited articles at Harvard Business Review. “Winning by Strategy”, which was published in 2004 in Chinese, is the bestseller in business books in China. His 2007 book “Dragons at the Door: How Chinese Cost Innovation is Transforming Global Competition” by Harvard Business School Press, is one of the first books that systematically investigates the global impact of emerging Chinese multinationals, and has become a classic in the field. He is currently writing a new book about how e-commerce is going to transform global economy.

Dr. Zeng has published widely in world’s top management journals, including Academy of Management Review, Organization Science, Journal of International Business Studies, Harvard Business Review, Sloan Management Review and California Management Review. His research has been highlighted in Wall Street Journal, Economist, CNBC and BBC.


Ming Zeng obtained his Ph.D in International Business and Strategy from University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA (1998), and BA in Economics from Fudan University (1991).