Richard Liu Qiangdong is the founder and CEO of JD.com, one of the largest e-commerce companies in China. He is also a member of the Chinese Communist Party and was born in Suqian, Jiangsu Province.
Liu’s father was a migrant worker who traveled around looking for manual labor jobs to support his family, and his mother was a stay-at-home mom who took care of Liu and his two younger sisters. The family lived in a small house with no running water or electricity, and Richard Liu would often help his father pull the cart loaded with goods they had repurchased from the market to their home. Despite their poverty, Liu’s parents were determined to give their children a good education, and Liu began attending school at almost seven years.
Determined to break out of the cycle of poverty his family was stuck in, Liu studied diligently and scored high enough on his college entrance exams to get into Renmin University in Beijing, one of China’s top universities. During his time at university, Liu first developed an interest in computer programming, and he began teaching himself how to code.
Liu Qiangdong’s coding skills turned out to be highly lucrative, as there was a growing demand for programmers in China in the late 1990s. He began working as a freelance programmer and soon started his own company, Jingdong, which specialized in developing website applications. The company was successful, and Liu could quit his job as a migrant worker and focus on his business full-time.
Richard is one of the wealthiest men in China, with a net worth of over $7 billion. He has also been philanthropic and donated over $1.5 billion to various causes. In 2015, he was named one of Fortune magazine’s “40 Under 40”, a list of the most influential young people in business.
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More about Liu Qiangdong on https://ir.jd.com/liu-qiangdong-jd-ceo-about