Ant Financial's 170 Days of Independent Operations: Accelerated Commercialization Targeting "ABC" for Future Layout

Ant Financial's 170 Days of Independent Operations: Accelerated Commercialization Targeting "ABC" for Future LayoutAfter 170 days of independent operations, Ant Financial's commercialization efforts have not slowed down. At the 2024 Inclusion Bund Summit, Ant Financial CEO Zhao Wenbiao made his first appearance in his new role, sharing the company's recent insights and future plans, and expressing his expectation of "breakeven this year

Ant Financial's 170 Days of Independent Operations: Accelerated Commercialization Targeting "ABC" for Future Layout

After 170 days of independent operations, Ant Financial's commercialization efforts have not slowed down. At the 2024 Inclusion Bund Summit, Ant Financial CEO Zhao Wenbiao made his first appearance in his new role, sharing the company's recent insights and future plans, and expressing his expectation of "breakeven this year."

Ant Financial's path to independence can be traced back to the organizational restructuring of Ant Group six months ago. On March 19, Ant Group Chairman and CEO Jing Xian'dong sent a letter to all employees, announcing the establishment of independent boards of directors for Ant Financial, Ant International, and OceanBase, making them independently market-oriented and implementing a CEO responsibility system under the leadership of the board of directors. Zhao Wenbiao, former president of Ant Group's Big Security Business Group, took over as CEO of Ant Financial, leading the team to "step out of Ant" and face market competition directly.

Zhao Wenbiao holds a doctorate from both Shanghai Jiao Tong University and Rutgers University in the United States. He is an authority in intelligent risk control and security technology. He served as vice president at American Express and joined Ant Group in 2016, leading the team to build the core risk control system for Alipay and Ant Group. His extensive experience and technical expertise have instilled strong confidence in his leadership of Ant Financial.

Since going independent, Zhao Wenbiao has been pondering how to "be a good partner for enterprise digitalization." He has led the team to focus on "ABC" businesses, namely Cloud+ services, AI+ services, and Blockchain+ services, to provide comprehensive solutions for enterprise digital transformation, all centered around enterprise digitalization needs.

"ABC" Businesses: Building Full-Chain Enterprise Digitalization Solutions

• Cloud+ Services: Help global enterprises achieve digital cloud migration. Under the development of cloud native, Ant Financial has developed mPaaS, a multi-terminal development platform, and SOFAStack, a cloud native platform, to provide enterprises with efficient and reliable cloud service products. mPaaS, as a super-app development tool, has been chosen by over 2,000 apps and 10,000 developers, and has partnered with Huawei's HarmonyOS to achieve the highest market share in the financial sub-sector.

• AI+ Services: Utilize AI technology to help enterprises improve efficiency in scenarios such as risk control and marketing, and better adapt to the era of large models. Ant Financial's cloud computing technology products are evolving from cloud native to AI native, using AI technology to reconstruct application development and operation and maintenance in the cloud environment, achieving a comprehensive upgrade from cloud PaaS to AIPaaS. This year's goal includes AI-ization of SofaStack.

• Blockchain+ Services: Help industry customers who have already completed digitalization to develop businesses and collaborate more trustingly, accelerating the circulation of data assets. Ant Financial has global leading technological advantages in blockchain, privacy computing, and other fields, and owns the BaaS platform Ant Chain and the commercial privacy computing platform Morse. Last year, Ant Financial launched Web3 product and service brand ZAN, providing Web3 node services, and offering RealWorldAsset (RWA) compliant asset issuance solutions for institutional clients. In August this year, a first-time issuance of 100 million yuan based on RWA of new energy physical assets was successfully launched in Hong Kong through the cooperation between Ant Financial and Langxin Technology. By leveraging the integrated technologies of artificial intelligence, blockchain, and IoT, the value, operation, and earnings data of charging piles are packaged and stored on the blockchain, forming digital tokens, enabling tokenized financing.

Zhao Wenbiao believes that Ant Financial has connected the chain between physical assets and digital assets, bringing blockchain technology to physical industries, allowing small and medium-sized enterprises to achieve inclusive financing. A Boston Consulting Group report shows that by 2030, the global tokenized asset market will reach $16 trillion, accounting for 10% of global GDP, with enormous potential for the RWA market. Ant Financial is making every effort to become the world's largest physical asset blockchain platform with technological support, seizing market share.

Data Elements: The Second Layer of B+ Business

Besides RWA, data elements are also seen by Zhao Wenbiao as the second layer of Ant Financial's B+ business. Ant Financial has specifically established a Zhilin Shutong Department dedicated to data element technology research and development and application scenario exploration. As data becomes a key factor of production and core asset, high-speed circulation of data assets will drive the development of industrial digitalization into a new stage, from improving IoT efficiency to industry digitalization efficiency and then to transaction efficiency.

Overseas Business Growth of 300%, Accelerating "Technological Going Global"

Over the past year, Ant Financial's customer base has grown by 35%, and nearly 90 industry scenarios have been implemented, serving over 10 million customers globally. Among them, overseas business (including Southeast Asia) has grown by 300%. This is due to Ant Group's "accumulated and released" technological advantage, as well as the scale, security, and performance advantages of products that have been fully validated in the Chinese market.

Ant Financial's security technology brand ZOlOZ has performed outstandingly in overseas markets, contributing significantly to the 300% growth. Based on the accumulation of Ant's risk control experience, ZOlOZ provides full-chain risk control products and services based on trusted AI and trusted data technology, including online identity authentication, anti-money laundering, and risk control decision-making technical support.

The mobile development platform Ant mPaaS has also performed well overseas, providing a complete set of development solutions for Kenanga, the largest investment bank in Malaysia, to help it launch the wealth management super-app "KDiGO."

Currently, Ant Financial has brought its security technology platform ZOLOZ, mobile development platform Ant mPaaS, cloud native PaaS platform SOFAStack, and Web3.0 technology service product ZAN to overseas markets. Among them, ZAN has already served 300 million users overseas. More mature products will also accelerate their overseas expansion. The overseas market is one of the main directions that Zhao Wenbiao is leading the team to focus on, and he even expects that the revenue share of overseas business will reach 40% in the next few years.

Rooted in Digital Technology, Hope to Achieve Breakeven This Year

This year, Ant Financial's overall business growth rate has reached double that of last year, and Zhao Wenbiao is satisfied with the company's current development status and has set a small goal of "breakeven." He emphasized that independent operation means accepting the test of the market, and growing the business is the key.

Zhao Wenbiao's commercial expectations for Ant Financial are: A+ is not losing money, B+ is full of prospects, C+ has unlimited imagination. He believes that every business needs to integrate multiple technologies to solve enterprise digitalization problems.

Ant Financial will continue to resolutely invest in technology talent and continuously accumulate leading technologies, which is the foundation of the company. Currently, nearly 70% of Ant Financial's employees have a technical background, and there will be a 10-20% increase in technology investment in the future.

Zhao Wenbiao believes that Ant Financial's business will achieve a major leap in the next 2-3 years, and the most important thing right now is to take solid steps, lay a solid foundation, and lay a solid foundation for future development.

In summary, after going independent, Ant Financial is moving towards a "ABC" future layout and a "breakeven" goal, leveraging its leading technological capabilities, extensive business experience, and clear commercialization strategy. The rapid growth of overseas business also demonstrates Ant Financial's strong technical capabilities and development potential. The future is bright.