In a move to cash in on India's huge market base, one of the world’s biggest business-to-business (B2B) portal company Alibaba has said that it is actually scouting for local partners and possible acquisitions. The plans are in sync with the company’s plans to look beyond China and go global.

Speaking to reporters Alibaba.com’s CEO Jack Ma said that he believed that China and India together had much more e-commerce potential than the US, given their populations and demographic profiles and hence the expansion plans.

Interestingly for its India plans, Alibaba seems to be shifting from its earlier idea of doing everything by itself including its B2b portal, an internet auction site TaoBao and an e-payment facilitator Alipay. The company is now adopting a different model of having local partners and promoting entrepreneurship.