The Great Walmart of China - The New Yorker

Excerpt from an Alibaba overview

"Because its business is Web-based, Alibaba is often described, in shorthand, as the Amazon or eBay of China, but that’s not quite right. When Amazon and eBay were founded, in the mid-nineties, the middle class in the U.S. was already well-formed, with plenty of other retailers, including Walmart, catering to it; all Amazon and eBay did was to bring commerce to the Internet. But Alibaba emerged in China at the same time that its middle class was starting to grow rapidly—in that sense, it’s more like Walmart, whose rise coincided with the rise of the middle class in the U.S."

The Great Walmart of China - The New Yorker