Alibaba executives join Jack Ma in rice-planting event amid AI push
Synopsis
Alibaba founder Jack Ma joined CEO Eddie Wu and the company's entire senior leadership — including Ant Group's chairman and CEO — for a rice-planting exercise in Hangzhou, with an internal post urging staff to 'endure' as Alibaba doubles down on AI. The rare public alignment of Ma with current management stands out.
Key Takeaways
Jack Ma Yun joined Alibaba 's current senior leadership for a rice-planting team-building event in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province , in a rare public appearance alongside operational management.
Liu Zhenfei , Alibaba partner and Amap chairman, published an internal post on Monday, 23 June 2026 urging endurance and disciplined effort as the company accelerates its AI strategy.
The group 'only managed to plant half an acre of paddy field crookedly' after a full morning's work, according to Liu 's own account.
Ant Group chairman Eric Xiandong Jing and CEO Cyril Xinyi Han attended alongside core Alibaba executives, suggesting cross-entity coordination on AI initiatives.
Other attendees included CEO Eddie Wu Yongming , CTO Wu Zeming , chief scientist Zhou Jingren , E-Commerce Business Group CEO Jiang Fan , and chief people officer Jane Fang Jiang .
Alibaba Group Holding executives, including founder Jack Ma Yun, gathered in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, eastern China, for a rice-planting team-building exercise, with a senior partner using the occasion to call for hard work and endurance as the company sharpens its artificial intelligence strategy.
The message from the fields
Liu Zhenfei, Alibaba partner and chairman of mapping service Amap, published an internal blog post on the company's intranet on Monday, 23 June 2026, reflecting on the event. 'The laws of the fields are very simple: when the season arrives, you must plant when it's time to plant, and endure when it's time to endure,' he wrote, according to Chinese news outlets.
Liu offered a candid account of the group's effort: 'A dozen or so of us worked all morning, yet we only managed to plant half an acre of paddy field crookedly.' Despite the modest output, his tone was optimistic — 'As long as you tend to the soil, choose the right seedlings, and do every little thing with care, just leave the rest to time. The land will never let you down.'
Who attended
The Hangzhou gathering brought together Alibaba's most senior leadership. Alongside Jack Ma Yun, attendees included CEO Eddie Wu Yongming, chief technology officer Wu Zeming, and chief scientist Zhou Jingren. Also present were E-Commerce Business Group CEO Jiang Fan, chief people officer Jane Fang Jiang, Ant Group chairman Eric Xiandong Jing, and Ant Group CEO Cyril Xinyi Han.
Why it matters
The optics of Jack Ma's visible participation in a senior leadership event carry weight. Ma, who stepped back from Alibaba's day-to-day operations years ago, has made increasingly public appearances alongside current management as the company navigates an intensely competitive AI landscape in China. The agricultural metaphor — patience, seasonal timing, disciplined effort — maps directly onto the long-horizon investments Alibaba is making in artificial intelligence infrastructure and research.
Alibaba has been accelerating its AI ambitions, investing heavily in large language models, cloud infrastructure, and AI-native applications. Liu's call for endurance signals that leadership is preparing the organisation for a prolonged competitive cycle rather than a short-term sprint.
The competitive backdrop
Chinese tech giants including Baidu, Tencent, and ByteDance are all racing to embed AI across their core products, while newer entrants such as DeepSeek have raised the bar on model efficiency. Alibaba's Qwen model family has gained traction globally, and the company's cloud division has positioned AI as a primary growth driver. Against this backdrop, the symbolic unity of senior leadership — including Ant Group's top executives — suggests a coordinated, cross-entity push.
What's next
Investors and analysts will be watching whether Alibaba's internal messaging of endurance and careful cultivation translates into measurable AI revenue growth in upcoming quarterly results. The alignment of Jack Ma, operational leadership, and affiliated entities like Ant Group at a single event points to a concerted effort to signal organisational cohesion at a pivotal moment for China's technology sector.
Point of View
An agricultural metaphor of patient cultivation is a pointed counter-narrative to the 'move fast' ethos of Western AI rivals. What mainstream coverage may underweight is the presence of Ant Group's top two executives alongside Alibaba's core team — a signal that the two entities, long kept at arm's length after regulatory friction, may be coordinating more openly on AI infrastructure. Liu Zhenfei's intranet post reads less like a wellness memo and more like a morale brief ahead of a prolonged, capital-intensive AI arms race. The real question is whether 'endurance' is a virtue or a euphemism for a harder road than the market expects.
NationPress
23 Jun 2026
Frequently Asked Questions
What was the Alibaba team-building event about?
Alibaba's senior leadership, including founder Jack Ma Yun and CEO Eddie Wu Yongming, gathered in Hangzhou, Zhejiang province, to plant rice seedlings as a team-building exercise. The event was reflected upon in an internal blog post by Alibaba partner and Amap chairman Liu Zhenfei, who used agricultural metaphors to urge hard work and endurance in the context of the company's AI ambitions.
Why did Jack Ma attend an Alibaba executive event?
Jack Ma's attendance signals his continued, if informal, involvement with Alibaba's senior leadership at a strategically important moment. The company is intensifying its artificial intelligence push, and Ma's visible presence alongside current management is widely read as a show of unified direction.
Who were the key executives at the Hangzhou rice-planting event?
Attendees included CEO Eddie Wu Yongming, CTO Wu Zeming, chief scientist Zhou Jingren, E-Commerce Business Group CEO Jiang Fan, chief people officer Jane Fang Jiang, Ant Group chairman Eric Xiandong Jing, and Ant Group CEO Cyril Xinyi Han, in addition to founder Jack Ma Yun and Liu Zhenfei.
What does Alibaba's internal messaging say about its AI strategy?
Liu Zhenfei's intranet post frames Alibaba's AI drive as a long-term, disciplined effort rather than a quick sprint, using the metaphor of seasonal farming — plant at the right time, endure, and trust the process. This suggests leadership is preparing the organisation for a sustained, capital-intensive competitive cycle in AI.
How does this event fit into Alibaba's broader AI competition in China?
Alibaba is competing with Baidu, Tencent, ByteDance, and newer AI players like DeepSeek across large language models and cloud AI services. The joint appearance of Alibaba and Ant Group executives at the same event suggests a coordinated cross-entity AI strategy, which could be significant given the two companies' historically cautious separation following past regulatory scrutiny.
