Image Source: Visual China

July 14, Beijing (TMTPost) – Alibaba has reportedly restructured its strategic investment department on Thursday, downsizing the investment team from 110 members to around 70.

People close to Alibaba said that the company laid off jobs in its investment team because of challenging market circumstances caused by the global coronavirus pandemic, geopolitics uncertainties and economic slowdown in China.

Statistics from Cailianshe show that Alibaba used to be active in the investment scene but it appeared to be investing less frequently in the first half of 2022. In the first half of the year, Alibaba only made 11 investments involving a total sum of 1.064 billion yuan.

Alibaba’s investment in ChangXin Memory Technologies was the most noteworthy investment projects from the company in the first half of 2022. The company specializes in semiconductor integrated devices and the production of DRAM memory. The company completed its new round of financing in February 2022, attracting investments from 19 investors, including Alibaba and Sunshine Life Insurance. ChangXin Memory Technologies has already become a leading unicorn in the semiconductor industry. The company attracted 220 investors in the last financing round.

Alibaba’s strategic investment team also participated in the 316 million yuan Series B round financing of FAIR, the C+ financing round of VR/AR device maker Nreal and the 100 million yuan Pre-A financing of Atom Semiconductor.

The strategic investment unit of Alibaba was formed in 2013, with the company’s financial investment team as its predecessor. After stepping down from the position of CFO, Cai Chongxin became responsible for the company’s strategic investment. Cai led the acquisitions of Xiami, Umeng, UC and onebox in one year.

Currently, Alibaba’s strategic investment team is partly supervised by CFO Xu Hong, chinastarmarket.cn reported, citing a source familiar with the matter. “The original director Wu Wei is basically retired,” the insider said.