Alibaba To Add 5,000 Workers To Its Cloud Division As It Plans $28B Investment

Alibaba Group Holdings Ltd. BABA on Tuesday said it was planning to add another 5,000 employees in its cloud unit by the end of this financial year globally.

What Happened

The employees will work in areas such as network, database, servers, chips, and artificial intelligence, the Chinese e-commerce giant said, as reported by Reuters.

"The digital transformation journey for businesses in China, which was previously expected to take three to five years, is now likely to be accelerated to be completed within one year," President of Alibaba Cloud Intelligence Jeff Zhang said, according to Reuters.

"To move forward in full speed, we are not only building trusted cloud technologies and services, but also investing in worldwide IT talents."

Why It Matters

Alibaba's statement comes two months after the company said it was planning to invest $28 billion in its cloud subsidiary. The company's cloud subsidiary makes up for 10% of its revenue.

The COVID-19 pandemic has increased the demand for cloud services, in line with an increased demand for remote services, Wedbush analyst Daniel Ives said at the time.

Alibaba Price Action

Alibaba shares closed 0.3% lower at $219 on Monday. The shares were mostly unchanged in the after-hours session.

Image: Alibaba Group