Innovation is key factor in business world: Alibaba CEO

Innovation is the key factor driving the new round of consumption and leading to a digital revolution in the business world, Alibaba Group's CEO Zhang Yong said.

He made those marks when talking about the 268.4 billion yuan ($38.4 billion) in record sales during the Singles Day shopping gala on Alibaba's e-commerce platform Tmall, at the 2019 Observing China Forum.

"The shopping gala on Singles Day is not a reflection of digitization but innovation," Zhang added.

The record high sales show how the enormous purchasing power of consumers injects new vitality into China's economic growth. The figure represented a 25.7 percent increase over the 213.5 billion yuan posted on Singles Day last year.

More than 22,000 overseas brands from 200 countries and regions participated in this year's shopping gala in China, according to data released by Alibaba.

"This is the new prosperity of a digital revolution," Liu Qiao, the dean of the Guanghua School of Management at Peking University, said at the forum. "This shopping event, fueled by advanced digital payment and assisted by high-quality goods, reflects the gradual change from 'made in China' to 'made for China'."

Consumption has been the largest driver for China's growth in the past five years. As evidenced by the record-high transactions on Singles Day, there is still huge potential to be released.

"The new supply brings new consumption demand, and skyrocketing sales are a reflection of the growth of thousands of enterprises that created supply up to customers' new demand," Zhang said.