"The chief executive of Alibaba Group, the Chinese retail goliath often described as Asia's Amazon, says rising political tension between China and Australia has not damaged business or trade relations.
Daniel Zhang instead insists that demand from middle-class Chinese consumers is too great to be disrupted by geopolitical friction, and sees "tremendous" growth ahead for Australian exporters to the region.
Some business leaders, including Andrew "Twiggy" Forrest, have criticised domestic debate about Chinese Communist Party influence on Australian politics and China's territorial ambitions in the South China Sea, saying it jeopardised the relationship with our largest trading partner.
But Mr Zhang said he saw no sign of it damaging business relationships, with his first trip to Australia as CEO of the $US449 billion ($590 billion) group highlighting to him the potential for more cross-border trade.
"People can see that the Chinese economy is in a good transition, to move from an export-driven, investment-driven economy to a consumption-driven economy, which gives a tremendous opportunity to business people all over the world," Mr Zhang told Fairfax Media from Sydney on Tuesday.
“When I share this with business partners in Australia, everybody wants to be part of this. There are over 300 million middle-class families in China - they are experiencing a consumption uplift. How to meet their growing demand is an opportunity for every business."
Mr Zhang said the Chinese government's comments last month that it expected to import $US8 trillion worth of goods over the next five years should be seen as a green light for Australian business considering entering the market.
And as China and the US hit each other with tit-for-tat tariffs, Mr Zhang said he saw e-commerce and digital supply chain technology as a "transparent way" for trade to be conducted.
“Everything from beginning to end is trackable. And this is all market driven - if demand is there… then people will go for this."
There are 55,000 Australian exporter accounts on Alibaba.com - the group's wholesale platform - and about 2000 Australian brands selling goods such as vitamins, powdered milk, food and wine direct to consumers through Alibaba's Tmall retail platform.
Australia was the third-highest selling foreign market on Alibaba's annual November 11 "Singles Day" promotion last year, the world's biggest shopping event which saw $US25 billion of sales in 24 hours.
Alibaba, which says it is the world's largest retailer by gross sales and is one of the world's top-10 biggest public companies by market value, opened its first Australian office in Melbourne last year.
While its relationship with Australia has been export focused, Mr Zhang said it also had a sizeable base of local customers and wanted to grow that segment as part of its long-term goal of having 2 billion customers worldwide.
Another avenue for growth in Australia is through Alibaba's payment platform Alipay, which has over 600 million customers who use it online and at bricks and mortar stores via their mobile phones.
There are now 10,000 merchants now accepting Alipay, including Chemist Warehouse, Priceline and Cabcharge, who are adopting the platform to cater to Australia's 1.2 million annual visitors from China, where the use of Alipay and rival WePay is ubiquitous.
Alipay has spawned a giant in its own right. Alibaba's financial services arm is offering users small loans, and now has more outstanding consumer loans than China's second biggest bank, according to Bloomberg.
It is also mining transaction data for insights into how it can better market products to users through its retail platforms. Mr Zhang said he saw the potential for this arm of his sprawling empire to grow in markets like Australia, and even convert non-Chinese customers.
“Globalisation is our long term strategy - we will still focus on Chinese people…. but we can do much more than that. Overtime we believe that more and more local people can use the Alipay wallet," he said."
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