3. No search result about China during his first encounter with Internet gave him business idea

Back in 1995, Jack Ma made his first trip to the US and tried Internet for the first time. He entered "beer" and found no result about beer in China, and he then realized there was no data about China then on the Internet.

"So, we made a very ugly page about China," said Ma, adding that he received emails immediately after the launch as they told him "it was the first time we saw a Chinese website."

Staff of Alibaba promote their online platform at a textile exhibition in Shanghai, Mar 26, 2008. [Photo/IC]