Photo from the heart of the Chinese Internet giant Alibaba Group

Initially published a post in "I am promoting", but kind people suggested that it is suitable for the hub " Offices of IT-companies ." Moreover, there is very little information in the Russian Internet about Chinese Internet companies, and even of such a scale. So, the scene of action - the capital of Zhejiang Province, Hangzhou. Go!

On the recently launched and so far the only metro line, I arrive somewhere in the suburbs, catch a taxi and say “师傅 ， 到 阿里巴巴 集团” ([Take] to Alibaba). We drive another ten minutes, go out into the street with the eloquent name of ul. E-commerce (网 商路) and in the distance you can see a futuristic building that somehow reminds me of a cow. “This is it,” I think, and now Denis Maccabee meets me at the gates of a huge complex, with whom we agreed to interview and travel to the heart of the Chinese Internet giant.
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Denis holds the position of Development Director for AliExpress , an international trading platform from Alibaba, which connects suppliers from China with customers from more than 200 countries. I came here to talk about the history of Alibaba and the activities of AliExpress, but first a tour.



I receive a guest pass with the image of a hardworking bull. As Denis later explained to me, the horned character A-Nu (阿牛) is one of the talismans of the Alibaba group of companies (“Our cash cow”). Virtually every site or product of the group has its own talisman, for example, the Tmall B2C platform has a “sky cat” (天 猫).



The headquarters is a complex of seven buildings that are connected by transitions. It has its own post office, a bank, a library and shops, canteens and cafes (one of the few Starbucks that is completely located inside another enterprise in China, Denis says).





Each employee has a badge on his neck, he is an electronic wallet, which is tied to a personal account in the Alipay payment system. Pay here only with it, and Starbucks also has a discount for company employees.



People on the street a little. All either work or study, or sit in a cafe and work or study there. The working day is from 9 to 6, but at 18:00 no one is in a hurry to leave. If you stay overtime and have dinner in the dining room, then compensation for dinner will be returned to your card. And for the "night owls" folding beds are always available.



Each employee has strict KPI and quarterly certification. In this case, the turnover is small.





But the company also cares about the state of mind of employees: they try to maintain a family atmosphere. Office romances are not uncommon, they are not prohibited, but they must be reported to the supervisor. And once a year, even held a day of mass weddings.



Employees are united in clubs of interest, someone for example in the paintball team.



For good results in the work of the department is given a bonus that employees can spend on the improvement of their working space. For example, an additional coffee machine, or your own personal drum.



Strictly no dress code. Denis himself is dressed like a summer in shorts and a light shirt. Later he told me a funny case that one of the company's offices in Beijing is located in the business district and is adjacent to the offices of other well-known companies. And now, neighbors even wrote a complaint to this office that Alibaba employees are “too free.”



And here is a fitness club with treadmills, a golf simulator, a room for yoga and Pilates, as well as billiards, badminton, table tennis and much more.





The complex has two dining rooms, which are given to the management of two different companies. Periodically they change places. Competition is maintained even here. By the way, the prices are quite “communist”: lunch is around 12-15 yuan. And there is even a free chowder.



A bookstore with a reading room, as well as a gift shop. Denis said that Alibaba is very strictly watching the gifts given to employees by representatives of other companies, and vice versa. Each gift is submitted for evaluation by a special commission and sent to the warehouse. So here they are fighting corruption.







Stands with photos of foreign employees Alibaba. This is not all. I propose to join Denis.





"Room of God." Here, in real-time mode, numerous data about who buys / sells goods on Alibaba sites is shown.



And here is the server room. A small piece of Alibaba.com is spinning here.



We are already moving towards the coveted cabinet, where there will be an interview. We pass by the main hall with a photo gallery about the history of the company. Here is the founder of Alibaba Ma Yun (Jack Ma) with Xi Jinping (the current chairman of the PRC). And here is a photo from 1999: in a rented apartment for the office of Ma, something tells his 18 colleagues at the dawn of the company's formation.





Read the Interview with Denis about AliExpress in the next part in a week. I would be happy for the comments and apologize for the "littered horizons" 囧!



Update on 09/24/2013: The second part came out - habrahabr.ru/post/194940