Richard Liu is the founder, chief executive officer, and chairman of JD.com formally Jingdong and 360buy Ltd. The company began in 2004. Born and raised in Jiangsu province in China, his parents were peasant rice farmers descendants of wealthy Chinese merchants who later lost their wealth. Their village lacked necessary conveniences like electricity and water.
Richard grew under his maternal grandmother’s care while his parents were busy working, and she taught him the simple ways to survive. Liu was a curious, ambitious young man who spent his childhood feeding his aspirations. He lived in a small world and dreamt that he would travel to big cities like New York, Beijing, and Paris one day.
He joined Renmin University where he pursued a degree in sociology. During his free time, he taught himself computer programming and started a business in handwriting copies of documents and letters. He saved up and bought a cell phone, a personal computer, and even built his parents a house.
While still at university, Richard opened up a restaurant, a business that failed due to his lack of management skills. He was however motivated to start his own business and years after the restaurant he began JD.com. He furthered his studies and worked for Japan Life, where he gained management skills and rose through the management ladder.
He started Jingdong in 1998 a business that rapidly grew to a full-size retail store in just five years with revenues of over $9million per annum. Liu Qiangdong grew his business online in 2003 when his country was struggling with the SARS pandemic. He launched his online business in 2004, and a year later, he let go of his instore business and went fully e-commerce.
JD builds its own logistics firm to deliver its products countrywide cutting off the third party and avoiding loss, damage, and the higher charges by third-party deliveries. This transformed e-commerce for JD.com and its billion users. JD began sourcing products directly from suppliers and delivering them directly to their customers.
In terms of transactional volume, JD.com commands 54.3% of the market share. Today JD.com is the largest retailer in China and the third-largest internet company in the world. It has been listed twice in fortune 500 company’s list in 2014 and 2016. Read More.