Jack Ma pledges 14 million dollars for developing coronavirus vaccine

Jack Ma -- founder of the e-commerce giant Alibaba and the richest man in China -- has donated 14 million dollars towards the development of a vaccine to combat the deadly coronavirus.

The donations were made through Jack's charitable foundation, out of which 5.8 million dollars would be handed over to two research organizations of the Chinese government, whereas the rest would go towards "prevention and treatment", New York Post quoted CNN.

New York Post cited CNBC which reported that the pharmaceutical manufacturer Johnson & Johnson seemed confident that it could find a vaccine for the disease.

"We have dozens of scientists working on this so we're pretty confident we can get something made that will work and stay active for the longer term," told Johnson & Johnson's chief scientific officer to CNBC.

However, it might take up to a year for the vaccine to hit the market.