Jeff Bezos will no longer be CEO of Amazon as of later this year

Comment

jeff bezos iac 2019 1

Amazon founder and current CEO Jeff Bezos will be transitioning to executive chair of the company sometime in Q3 of this year, with current AWS CEO Andy Jassy taking over the top executive role at the commerce company. Amazon announced the news alongside its earnings results on Tuesday.

Amazon initially rose after-hours as the market digested both the company’s earnings and its CEO news. The company beat on both earnings per share and revenues. That makes it hard to untangle the market’s response to its busy set of announcements. Update: Amazon shares have now dipped into negative territory as investors had more time to parse the company’s total collection of announcements.

Amazon crushed earnings-per-share and revenue expectations in Q4 2020. So, any investor worried about the exit of Bezos from the CEO chair were given some measure of of performance-based amelioration. Amazon’s quarter was its first to break the $100 billion mark, bringing in $125.6 billion in revenue against an anticipated $119.7 billion. And, the company’s $14.09 per share in earnings was nearly double an expected $7.23.

With a $50B run rate in reach, can anyone stop AWS?

Jassy has been identified previously as the likely successor to Bezos, after leading Amazon Web Services (AWS) to the success it currently enjoys as a leader in the cloud computing space. AWS grew its revenues by 28% in the quarter, lower than its year-ago growth rate of 34%. AWS’s net revenues expanded from $9.95 in the year-ago Q4 to $12.74 billion during the fourth quarter of 2020. Operating income at AWS scaled as well, from $2.6 billion in Q4 2019 to $3.56 billion in the most recent quarter.

Notably Microsoft’s Azure business grew 50% in its most recent earnings period.

Bezos sent an email to Amazon employees, which the company also released publicly on its blog on Tuesday following the announcement. In the missive, he says that while he continues to “find [his] work meaningful and fun,” he wants to be able to devote proper time and attention to his “Day 1 Fund, the Bezos Earth Fund, Blue Origin, The Washington Post, and [his] other passions.”

Blue Origin, Bezos’ space company, has achieved a lot to date, and regularly flies suborbital missions with its New Shepard launch vehicle. This coming year will be a busy one for the space company, since it should likely begin flying people on New Shepard for the first time.

In addition to its own human spaceflight goals, Blue Origin is currently developing a human lunar landing system for NASA, in partnership with other space industry leaders. It’s also working on another launch vehicle, New Glenn, which will be a heavy-lift class rocket capable of delivering payloads to orbit. So there’s a lot going on, there, too. Bezos has previously referred to Blue Origin as the “most important work that he’s doing” because of the scale of its potential impact on the future of humanity.

How AWS came to be

More TechCrunch

The watch features a variety of different 3D games, unlocking more play time the more kids move.

Fitbit’s new kid smartwatch is a little Wiimote, a little Tamagotchi

In the video, a crowd is roaring at a packed summer music festival. As a beat starts playing over the speakers, the performer finally walks on stage: it’s the Joker.…

Discord has become an unlikely center for the generative AI boom

After the Wirecard scandal, Germany’s financial regulator BaFin started to look more closely at young fintech startups that wanted to grow at a rapid pace — it’s better to be…

Germany’s financial regulator ends anti-money laundering cap on N26 signups after $10M fine

Among other things, this includes the ability to trace code from source to binary packages across both platforms, single sign-on support and unified project structures.

JFrog and GitHub team up to closely integrate their source code and binary platforms

The company’s public fund disbursement and e-commerce platform makes accepting school tuition and enabling educational enrichment more accessible. 

Tech startup Odyssey goes on journey to help states implement school choice programs

A new startup called Kinnect aims to help people privately save generational memories, traditions, recipes, and more. The company’s app, launched this month, lets people create invite-only spaces where they…

Kinnect’s new app aims to help families record and store generational memories

Spotify has hiked its premium subscription in France by an eye-watering €0.13, in response to a new music-streaming tax.

Spotify hikes subscription price in France by 1.2% to match new music-streaming tax

The European Union has taken the wraps off the structure of the new AI Office, the ecosystem-building and oversight body that’s being established under the bloc’s AI Act. The risk-based…

With the EU AI Act incoming this summer, the bloc lays out its plan for AI governance

Solutions by Text, a company that gives people a way to pay their bills and apply for loans via text messaging, has secured $110 million in new growth funding. Edison…

Bootstrapped for over a decade, this Dallas company just secured $110M to help people pay bills by text

Owners of small- and medium-sized businesses check their bank balances daily to make financial decisions. But it’s entrepreneur Yoseph West’s assertion that there’s typically information and functions missing from bank…

Relay raises $32.2 million to help smaller businesses manage their cashflow

When other firms were investing and raising eye-popping sums, Clean Energy Ventures took a different approach. It appears to be paying off.

How Clean Energy Ventures avoided the pandemic bubble and raised a $305M fund

PwC, the management consulting giant, will become OpenAI’s biggest customer to date, covering 100,000 users.

OpenAI signs 100K PwC workers to ChatGPT’s enterprise tier as PwC becomes its first resale partner

Tech enthusiasts and entrepreneurs, the clock is ticking! With just 72 hours remaining until the early-bird ticket deadline for TechCrunch Disrupt 2024, now is the time to secure your spot…

72 hours left of the Disrupt early-bird sale

Avendus, the top investment bank for venture deals in India, confirmed on Wednesday it is looking to raise up to $350 million for its new private equity fund.  The new…

Avendus, India’s top venture advisor, confirms it’s looking to raise a $350 million fund

China has closed a third state-backed investment fund to bolster its semiconductor industry and reduce reliance on other nations, both for using and for manufacturing wafers — prioritizing what is…

China’s $47B semiconductor fund puts chip sovereignty front and center

Apple’s annual list of what it considers the best and most innovative software available on its platform is turning its attention to the little guy.

Apple’s Design Awards nominees highlight indies and startups, largely ignore AI (except for Arc)

The spyware maker’s founder, Bryan Fleming, said pcTattletale is “out of business and completely done,” following a data breach.

Spyware maker pcTattletale says it’s ‘out of business’ and shuts down after data breach

AI models are always surprising us, not just in what they can do, but what they can’t, and why. An interesting new behavior is both superficial and revealing about these…

AI models have favorite numbers, because they think they’re people

On Friday, Pal Kovacs was listening to the long-awaited new album from rock and metal giants Bring Me The Horizon when he noticed a strange sound at the end of…

Rock band’s hidden hacking-themed website gets hacked

Jan Leike, a leading AI researcher who earlier this month resigned from OpenAI before publicly criticizing the company’s approach to AI safety, has joined OpenAI rival Anthropic to lead a…

Anthropic hires former OpenAI safety lead to head up new team

Welcome to TechCrunch Fintech! This week, we’re looking at the long-term implications of Synapse’s bankruptcy on the fintech sector, Majority’s impressive ARR milestone, and more!  To get a roundup of…

The demise of BaaS fintech Synapse could derail the funding prospects for other startups in the space

YouTube’s free Playables don’t directly challenge the app store model or break Apple’s rules. However, they do compete with the App Store’s free games.

YouTube’s free games catalog ‘Playables’ rolls out to all users

Featured Article

A comprehensive list of 2024 tech layoffs

The tech layoff wave is still going strong in 2024. Following significant workforce reductions in 2022 and 2023, this year has already seen 60,000 job cuts across 254 companies, according to independent layoffs tracker Layoffs.fyi. Companies like Tesla, Amazon, Google, TikTok, Snap and Microsoft have conducted sizable layoffs in the first months of 2024. Smaller-sized…

22 hours ago
A comprehensive list of 2024 tech layoffs

OpenAI has formed a new committee to oversee “critical” safety and security decisions related to the company’s projects and operations. But, in a move that’s sure to raise the ire…

OpenAI’s new safety committee is made up of all insiders

Time is running out for tech enthusiasts and entrepreneurs to secure their early-bird tickets for TechCrunch Disrupt 2024! With only four days left until the May 31 deadline, now is…

Early bird gets the savings — 4 days left for Disrupt sale

AI may not be up to the task of replacing Google Search just yet, but it can be useful in more specific contexts — including handling the drudgery that comes…

Skej’s AI meeting scheduling assistant works like adding an EA to your email

Faircado has built a browser extension that suggests pre-owned alternatives for ecommerce listings.

Faircado raises $3M to nudge people to buy pre-owned goods

Tumblr, the blogging site acquired twice, is launching its “Communities” feature in open beta, the Tumblr Labs division has announced. The feature offers a dedicated space for users to connect…

Tumblr launches its semi-private Communities in open beta

Remittances from workers in the U.S. to their families and friends in Latin America amounted to $155 billion in 2023. With such a huge opportunity, banks, money transfer companies, retailers,…

Félix Pago raises $15.5 million to help Latino workers send money home via WhatsApp

Google said today it’s adding new AI-powered features such as a writing assistant and a wallpaper creator and providing easy access to Gemini chatbot to its Chromebook Plus line of…

Google adds AI-powered features to Chromebook