The Rise of Alibaba and Chinese Commerce

If you teach AP Comparative, you might be interested in the Chinese company, Alibaba, which in a few weeks, will likely have the largest IPO ever.  Right now its value, which is somewhere around $200 billion, makes it worth more than Facebook and most Americans (and a lot of Chinese based on my informal poll) have never heard of it.  This NYTimes article does a good job of describing how Jack Ma (founder) could become a billionaire while straddling the issues of the Chinese government and working with international companies.