Alibaba has appointed Jane Penner to lead its IR efforts, as the firm gets into gear for its much-publicized US listing. Penner, who will be based in San Francisco, joins the Chinese e-commerce giant from Google, where she has served as head of IR since 2008.
Penner’s experience at a ‘global technology leader with nearly $60 bn in annual gross revenue’ has landed her the top IR job at the Chinese mammoth, reportedly the world’s ‘largest online and mobile commerce company in terms of gross merchandise volume’.
Jane Penner
Joins Alibaba from Google
An English graduate of Williams College and the University of Pennsylvania, Penner started her career as an editor for financial website TheStreet.com, where she launched RealMoney, a blog dedicated to professional investors. She was a managing director in Bear Stearns’ equity research division from 2004 to 2008.
Commenting on the appointment in a company press release, Alibaba’s CFO Maggie Wu says: ‘Jane is an experienced investor relations professional with strong knowledge of the technology sector and a proven record of building investor trust internationally. Jane’s appointment is part of our broader focus on building a long-term business for the future and her expertise will be especially important to Alibaba as our company enters this new and exciting phase.’
The Hangzhou-based firm filed for an IPO in the US in May, selecting the NYSE over NASDAQ for its public debut. An initial plan to list in Hong Kong was abandoned after the exchange stood firm on its ‘one share, one vote’ policy, which prohibits a dual-class share offering. The latter structure has been favored by the founders of technology companies such as Facebook or Google, as it allows a small group of owners to retain more voting rights. Jack Ma, Alibaba’s CEO, has insisted the firm will keep its partnership structure, where a group of 27 senior executives effectively have control over board nominations.
In addition to its flagship wholesale platform, the Alibaba group owns other online businesses such as Taobao, Tmall, Juhuasuan and AliExpress, as well as cloud computing services provider Aliyun. It also has interests in China Smart Logistics, a distribution information system. Alibaba posted $7.5 bn in revenue for 2013.
According to the latest Wall Street estimates, the offering is expected to raise more than $22 bn, potentially making the transaction the world’s largest IPO to date.
