Maggie Wu

In her 13 years at Alibaba, Wu has helped China’s largest e-commerce empire go public three times: once in 2007, when Alibaba.com started trading; again in 2014 as Alibaba went public on the NYSE; and a third time in 2019 when Alibaba carried out a secondary listing in Hong Kong. Alibaba’s debut in Hong Kong raised $11.2 billion, making it 2019’s biggest IPO at the time. (Saudi Aramco eclipsed it weeks later.) When Alibaba founder Jack Ma stepped down from the company’s 11-member board, it selected Wu to fill his seat—a promotion she received in October that was a nod to her value at the firm.