On April 21st, it was reported that Hema founder Hou Yi and former Alibaba CEO Zhang Yong were interested in partnering to bid for Hema for $2 billion.
On the 21st, a reporter from Pengpai News learned from insiders close to Hou Yi that the news was untrue. "It's nonsense, there's no such thing. Including the previous statement that Hema was acquired by COFCO, it's also nonsense," the person said.
In March of this year, Hema released a letter to all employees stating that Hou Yi had officially retired at the age of 60 and would serve as Hema's Chief Honorary Advisor. Yan Xiaolei (flower name: Baihe), who is currently Hema's CFO, also serves as CEO. In the letter from all employees, Alibaba Group highly praised Hou Yi's contribution to the start and development of Hema.
Hema was founded in 2015, and as one of its founders, Hou Yi is well-known to the outside world for his innovation and distinctive personal style. Hema has brought digital management to the retail industry, making integrated online and offline operations mainstream. As of now, Hema has over 360 stores in 29 cities.
However, since the end of last year, there have been frequent rumors that Hema, which is positioned as a new retail format, has been sold by Alibaba.
On March 16th, it was reported that Alibaba has basically decided to sell RT Mart and Hema to COFCO internally. RT Mart is estimated to be around 10 billion yuan, while Hema is estimated to be around 20 billion yuan. The framework agreement between the two parties has been drafted, and Jack Ma has made the final decision within Alibaba. Regarding the news that Hema and RT Mart will be sold to COFCO, both Hema and RT Mart have denied it. Hema has stated that both the sale and price are false information.
On February 7th, Alibaba released its financial report for the third quarter of the 2024 fiscal year (quarterly results for December 2023), in which Hema's performance was classified as "other segment revenue". As of the latest three months ended December 31, 2023, the revenue of all other divisions was 47.023 billion yuan, a year-on-year decrease of 7%. All other businesses include Gaoxin Retail, Hema, Alibaba Health, Lingxi Interactive Entertainment, Intime, Intelligent Information (mainly including UC Youshi and Quark businesses), Feizhu, DingTalk (previously reported in the Cloud Intelligence Group branch), and other businesses.
Zhang Yong, who was rumored to have acquired Hema with Hou Yi, has taken on a new job after stepping down as Chairman of Alibaba. On March 21, according to the news from Chenyi Investment's WeChat official account, Zhang Yong will join Chenyi Fund and work together with founder Liu Xiaodan as the managing partner to explore the new future of Buyout Fund.
Regarding the latest trends, Zhang Yong said, "We hope to use the vibrant and innovative platform of Chenyi to focus on the enormous opportunities brought about by technological development and economic transformation and upgrading, as well as industrial transformation and value chain reshaping. Based in China and looking at the world, we will integrate the capabilities and resources of both parties in enterprise management, industrial operation, and capital markets, and build a core competitiveness for future M&A investment."
On September 10, 2023, Alibaba Group Chairman Cai Chongxin mentioned in a letter to all members that the Alibaba Board of Directors has accepted Zhang Yong's request to resign from the positions of Chairman and CEO of Alibaba Cloud. Starting from today, the Chairman and CEO of Alibaba Cloud will be concurrently held by Group CEO Wu Yongming. Prior to this, Zhang Yong had resigned from his position as Chairman of the Board and CEO of Alibaba Holding Group.
The above-mentioned letter also mentioned that Alibaba Group will invest $1 billion to support Zhang Yong in establishing a future oriented technology fund, "assisting Alibaba in its future technology layout and creating a better ecological environment.".