September 16, 2005 September 16, 2005 (Shanghai) –Alibaba.com addressed an audience of more than 200 procurement and sourcing executives at the American Chamber of Commerce's (AmCham) annual Sourcing and Procurement Conference 2005. Held at the Grand Hyatt Ballroom in Shanghai, this conference is one of the chamber's largest, most popular events, attracting senior executives from some of the world's largest multinationals. Companies in attendance included Wal-Mart, Home Depot, Coca-Cola, 3M, Armstrong, Bechtel, Bristol-Meyers Squib, Eli Fisher, GM, GE, Grainger, ITT, Honeywell, Yum! Restaurants, Rockwell Automation Power Systems, Adidas-Salomon International Sourcing and many others.

Alibaba's head of International Business Development, Brian A. Wong, spoke as part of the conference's first panel entitled, “Taking Your Supplier Base to the Next Level: Finding and Qualifying Suppliers.” Wong introduced “value e-marketplaces” and explained how they address the four major considerations of most buyers: access to a supplier base with depth and breadth, trust and credibility of supplier, quality of service and lowest cost. “By utilizing an e-marketplace such as Alibaba.com, sourcing offices can lower the time and costs of identifying key suppliers in China and around the world,” Wong said.

Petros Sakkis, Director of Wessco International, says he and his staff very frequently use Alibaba.com to source products in China. As a result, he said he finds himself attending fewer and fewer trade shows.

Other topics discussed at this day-long conference included, “Trust but Verify: Ethics and Social Responsibility,” “Taking Sourcing to the Next Level: European/UK Perspective,” “HR Management: China Factor,” “Facing and Managing the Macro Business Risks for China Sourcing,” and, “Where we are and Where we are heading- Current Practices and Further Trends for sourcing in China.”

.