It’s been a few decades since China’s economy began its climb to become the world’s second largest economy and that has produced a lot of millionaires. One of them– Alibaba founder Jack Ma– just became one of the world’s wealthiest. CCTV America’s Cathy Yang reports on what it takes to become a millionaire in China.

Jack Ma, executive chairman of Alibaba Group, has become the richest man in China with a fortune estimated at 150 billion yuan (roughly 24.4 billion U.S. dollars), said a rich list released last week.

Ma, 50, took the top spot in the “Hurun Rich List 2014” compiled by the Hurun Research Institute, knocking Wang Jianlin, head of Chinese property developer Dalian Wanda Group, into the second place with a fortune of 145 billion yuan (roughly 23.6 billion U.S. dollars), according to the list.

It is the first time that Ma has topped the list, thanks to Alibaba’s record-setting initial public offering (IPO) on the New York Stock Exchange this month that catapulted the company’s valuation to well over 200 billion U.S. dollars. Ma owns 7.8 percent of Alibaba.

The list also shows that five of the top 10 richest individuals in China come from the information technology (IT) industry. In addition to Jack Ma, Pony Ma, founder of the Chinese Internet giant Tencent, is ranked at the fifth place with a wealth of 108.5 billion yuan (roughly 17.7 billion U.S. dollars), followed by Robin Li, chief executive officer (CEO) of China’s biggest online search engine Baidu.com, with 105 billion yuan (roughly 17.1 billion U.S. dollars).

Liu Qiangdong, CEO of the Chinese e-commerce platform JD.com, stands at ninth with 53 billion yuan (roughly 8.6 billion U.S. dollars), while Lei Jun, founder and CEO of the Chinese smartphone brand Xiaomi, is at 10th with a fortune of 45 billion yuan (roughly 7.3 billion U.S. dollars).

A total of 1,271 Chinese entrepreneurs on the list have a personal fortune of at least 2 billion yuan (roughly 325 million U.S. dollars), compared with 1,017 last year, according to the list. And nearly half of the billionaires on the list amassed their fortunes from the industries of manufacturing and real estate.

Analysts say those on China’s rich list now reveal a trend away from people who were positioned well in terms of who they knew – and in gaining early access to industries that were going to grow well as the Mainland economy developed. That’s why the entrepreneurial spirit that has caught on the Mainland does not appear to be losing steam, even amid a corruption crackdown. Three of the top six also speak fluent English, including Ma, underscoring the globalization of the Chinese private sector, says the Hurun report.