(Yicai Global) Sept. 19 -- Manufacturing sector will be completely transformed through the artificial intelligence era, according to Jack Ma, Alibaba Group Holding's executive chairman.

The New Manufacture will redefine the industry, the customer market and the supply chain, Ma said at the Hangzhou internet giant's Computing Conference today, adding that the sector will be based on customized on demand.

The physical manufacturing will not vanish, but the backward one will, Ma said, speaking in terms of a time frame of 10 to fifteen years. It took five minutes to make 2,000 identical clothes, but 2,000 different clothes can be made in five minutes in the future, he said. What the business will face is not only technological changes but also a revolution in thought models, he added. 

Regarding jobs, it is the service industry that can really create workplaces in the future and the New Manufacture is a perfect combination of manufacturing and service industries, the tech billionaire said. 

Ma spoke about the differences between information technology and data tech, while hailing the latter. DT exerts the creation industry and requires wisdom while IT generates manufacturing and relies on knowledge. DT firms are also less focused on becoming big in size but becoming more connected with "platform thinking," according to Ma.

Editor: Emmi Laine