NEW YORK: Jeff Bezos, the creator of Amazon, stepped down as CEO on Monday (July 5), giving over the keys as the company faces the challenges of a globe still recovering from the coronavirus outbreak. Bezos was replaced by Andy Jassy, the head of Amazon’s cloud computing division, which the company announced in February.
Bezos, Amazon’s largest stakeholder, will retain control of the business he founded in his Seattle garage in 1995 with a stake valued around US$180 billion. He will take over as executive chair and will concentrate on new products and projects. Jassy takes over a US$1.7 trillion corporation that benefited immensely from the epidemic, more than tripling profits and posting record sales in the first quarter of 2021 as customers became increasingly reliant on internet purchasing. At the same time, Amazon is dealing with protests from a disgruntled staff, and a strong economic recovery has resulted in a labor shortage, with retailers, manufacturers, and other businesses competing for workers by offering greater wages and other incentives. Workers in one Alabama warehouse attempted to form a union earlier this year, but Amazon now faces a more formidable fight as the International Brotherhood of Teamsters launches a nationwide drive to unionize Amazon workers. Bezos announced earlier this year that he will devote more time to side projects like as his space exploration business Blue Origin, his charity activities, and overseeing The Washington Post, which he owns, in a blog post to staff.
First and foremost, according to Forbes, the world’s wealthiest man will realize a childhood desire of traveling to space. On July 20, Bezos, 57, will launch into space with his younger brother Mark, an investor and volunteer firefighter, when Blue Origin undertakes its maiden mission with a crew. Bezos started Amazon as an online bookshop and grew it into a retail and entertainment conglomerate that is now the US’s second-largest private employer, behind Walmart. Amazon, which is buying MGM in its latest significant acquisition, now produces movies and sofas, owns a grocery store chain, and aims to launch satellites into space to beam internet access to Earth. Jassy, who has been with Amazon since 1997, oversaw the cloud-computing division, which powers Netflix and a slew of other companies, and was one of Amazon’s most successful divisions. Growing calls for greater regulation of digital firms are one of Jassy’s challenges. In a report released in October, the House Judiciary Committee suggested that Amazon and others be broken up, making it more difficult for them to acquire companies and enforcing new competition restrictions./n
