Gan is best known for being the 67th employee of Alibaba and the former COO of Meituan-Dianping. Before joining Alibaba in 1999, Gan had worked at a state-owned coal trading enterprise for five years. At Alibaba, he served in multiple roles, including as director of online operation, director of marketing, regional manager and vice president. Gan left Alibaba to become COO of Meituan in 2011. In 2016, he was named the first president of Meituan-Dianping's Internet Plus University, which was founded to train company employees. Gan resigned from Meituan-Dianping in 2017 to join Hillhouse Capital as managing partner.