Daniel Zhang was slated to lead Alibaba’s new cloud computing division as the firm undergoes a major reorganisation.
After years of turbulence in the Chinese tech sector, Alibaba in March announced the biggest restructuring in its history, dividing itself into six entities, with the goal of listing them on the stock exchange separately. “The board of our Company expresses its deepest appreciation to Mr Zhang for his contributions to Alibaba Group over the past 16 years,” the company said in a statement to the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, where it is listed, late on Sunday.Plans for a spin-off cloud computing firm would go ahead, Alibaba said, “under a separate management team to be appointed”.
Shares in the firm sank nearly 3.5% Monday — the first working day of its new reorganisation into six distinct branches.