Jeff Bezos to Step Down as Amazon CEO

Amazon founder and CEO Jeff Bezos
(Image credit: Amazon)

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is stepping as CEO in the third quarter and will be replaced by Andy Jassy, who serves as chief executive of the company’s cloud technology division, AWS.

Bezos will assume the role of executive chairman. 

The announcement was made Tuesday during Amazon’s fourth quarter earnings call. 

“Right now I see Amazon at its most inventive ever, making it an optimal time for this transition,” Bezos said in a statement.

Bezos had stepped away from day-to-day operations, but has been recently re-engaged, with pandemic-era consumption expanding Amazon's ship-to-doorstep business to previously unimagined profitability. 

On Tuesday, the company reported that net sales for 2020  increased 38% to $386.1 billion, with net income nearly doubling for the year to $21.3 billion. 

In December, Bloomberg pegged Bezos's personal net worth at $182 billion. 

Jassy joined Amazon in 1997 shortly after Bezos founded the company as an online seller of books. He founded Amazon Web Services (AWS) in 2003 with a team of 57 staffers, ultimately building it into the world's biggest provider of cloud-based computing services.

Generating between $100 million and $106 million in the fourth quarter alone, AWS's revenue could soon surpass the company it serves as a subsidiary.  

Daniel Frankel

Daniel Frankel is the managing editor of Next TV, an internet publishing vertical focused on the business of video streaming. A Los Angeles-based writer and editor who has covered the media and technology industries for more than two decades, Daniel has worked on staff for publications including E! Online, Electronic Media, Mediaweek, Variety, paidContent and GigaOm. You can start living a healthier life with greater wealth and prosperity by following Daniel on Twitter today!