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Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos steps down. Who’s taking over?
Amazon is a modern-day empire that, for a time, made CEO Jeff Bezos the richest man in the world. With a net worth of $184 billion, he turned a humble online bookstore into the world’s most powerful company.
Now, the emperor is stepping down. After 27 years of leadership, Bezos is ready to set down the crown. He announced Tuesday he will transition to a new position later this year.
In the third quarter of 2021 — or around July — Bezos’ role will be Amazon’s executive chair and a new CEO will take the reins. Keep reading for more on Bezos’ successor.
Meet the new head honcho
The upcoming Amazon CEO is currently the chief executive of Amazon’s web services, Andy Jassy, who joined Amazon way back in 1997. He’s led Amazon’s web services cloud team since the beginning.
Amazon first went live in 1995; by the end of the year, it raked in $511,000 in sales. To say the profits blossomed would be a colossal understatement. For all of 2020, Amazon sales rose 37% year over year to $380.06 billion, the Wall Street Journal reported.
Let’s put that number into perspective. The most expensive watch in the world is the Graff Diamonds Hallucination, a glistening cluster of multi-colored diamonds arranged around a little pink clock. It’s worth $55 million.
With $308.06 billion, you could buy about 5,600 of these gorgeous watches. There would be too many to cover your arms, so you’d have to stretch them around your legs, too — you would have enough watches to cover every inch of your body, so you shimmered like a statue made of precious stones.
You’d still have a lot of money left. You could give these watches to all of your friends and cover them with these sparkling, diamond-encrusted watches. Thus, you could start an entire colony of sparkling people — yet you’d still have extra watches to give away.
Why did Bezos step away from such a powerful position?
Although Bezos will no longer be the top dog in the company, he plans to stay involved in big projects. He said he wants to focus on the Bezos Earth Fund, his Blue Origin spaceship company, The Washington Post and the Amazon Day 1 Fund.
Now that Bezos has dropped this bombshell, we wonder what’s next for him. Will he make any big changes in his final months? And how will Jassy differ from his predecessor?
Of course, we’ll be here every step of the way to give you updates. Make sure you never miss a headline by signing up for our newsletters. You’ll get the biggest news of the day straight to your inbox!
Tags: Amazon, company, Jeff Bezos, net worth, newsletters, sales, Transition, updates, Washington Post
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