Alibaba’s future hangs on IPOs of spawned units

New strategy: A pedestrian walks past Alibaba’s headquarters in Hangzhou. The company is splitting off business divisions equal to almost half its value. — Bloomberg

A SIX-WAY split of Alibaba Group Holding Ltd means the value of China’s largest eCommerce player will be increasingly divorced from its actual operations, depending instead on equity-market assessments of the units it spins off.

That would make the first few initial public offerings (IPOs) – when they happen – crucial to the conglomerate’s future.