Seminar paper from the year 2014 in the subject Business economics - Trade and Distribution, grade: 1,4, Reutlingen University, language: English, abstract: Although, everybody has heard about the cyber giant "Alibaba", the majority is not familiar with the company's business therefore, this paper concentrates on giving some insights about the real impact of the Alibaba group. Firstly, the paper elucidates the company's structure and its latest actions, especially the acquisitions in the ASEAN countries secondly, the paper analyses the meaning of its IPO, as well as the company's impact on the overall economy, focusing especially on Alibaba's strengths and weaknesses; finally, the paper concludes whether the news are over- or underestimating the power of Alibaba, it answers if Alibaba actually have an influence on us and what additional value proposition Alibaba has, aside from being a Chinese version of Amazon.