Amazon.com (NASDAQ:AMZN) Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Jeff Bezos, long the public face of the online retailer, will step down in the third quarter of 2021 and be replaced by Andy Jassy, the head of the company’s cloud computing unit.
The leadership change was announced as Amazon reported yet another blockbuster quarter and provided strong forward guidance.
Amazon reported fourth-quarter sales rose 44% to $125.6 billion U.S., beating analysts’ average estimate of $119.7 billion U.S. Earnings were $14.09 U.S. per share, compared with analyst projections of $7.34 U.S.
Going forward, Amazon forecast that its revenue will be $100 billion U.S. to $106 billion U.S. in the current quarter ending on March 31. The company projected operating income of $3 billion U.S. to $6.5 billion U.S. Analysts, on average, estimated profit of $6.07 billion U.S. on sales of $95.72 billion U.S., according to data from Bloomberg Markets.
In terms of the CEO transition, Jassy, 53, has long been seen as a potential successor to Bezos, who founded the company as an online bookstore from his Seattle garage more than 25 years ago and became one of the world’s wealthiest men.
Bezos, 57, the company’s driving force since its founding, will become Executive Chairman of Amazon after stepping down as CEO later this year. Bezos isn’t going far, much the way Bill Gates remained chairman of Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ:MSFT) after ceding the CEO role.
The transition arrives at time when Amazon seems unstoppable, fueled by record sales amid the pandemic and generating massive cash and profits from Amazon Web Services, which Jassy helped create and manage.
If there is one downside, it is Amazon’s rising expenses related to COVID-19, which include lost productivity due to social distancing as well as stepped up cleaning throughout the company’s warehouses and shipping centers. Those costs will add $2 billion U.S. to expenses in the current quarter, Amazon said.
Tech Insider
