Amazon (company)

Amazon.com, Inc. (doing business as Amazon) is an American multinational technology company engaged in e-commerce, cloud computing, online advertising, digital streaming, entertainment, and artificial intelligence. Founded in 1994 by Jeff Bezos in Bellevue, Washington, the company started as an online book marketplace that gradually expanded to include virtually all consumer products as well as many other categories, positioned as "The Everything Store".

As of 2026 it was the world's biggest online retailer. Amazon sells books, electronics, pharmaceuticals, car parts, video games, dining products, jewelry, food, music, and sports equipment.

The company has multiple subsidiaries, including Amazon Web Services (AWS), which provides cloud computing; Zoox, a self-driving car division; satellite Internet provider Kuiper Systems; and Amazon Lab126, a computer hardware R&D provider. Other subsidiaries include Ring, Twitch, IMDb, and grocer Whole Foods Market. Amazon distributes downloadable and streaming content through its Amazon Prime Video, MGM+, Amazon Music, Twitch, Audible, and Wondery units. It publishes books through its publishing arm, Amazon Publishing; produces and distributes film and television content through Amazon MGM Studios, including the Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer studio; and owns Brilliance Audio and Audible, which produce and distribute audiobooks, respectively. Amazon produces consumer electronics, most notably Kindle e-readers, Echo devices, Fire tablets, and Fire TVs.

Amazon has a reputation as an industry disruptor through innovation and aggressive reinvestment of profits. As of 2023, it was the largest online retailer and marketplace, smart speaker provider, cloud computing service provider through AWS, live-streaming service provider through Twitch, and Internet company as measured by revenue and market share. In 2021, it surpassed Walmart as the world's largest retailer outside of China, supported by its subscription plan, Amazon Prime, which had 200 million subscribers worldwide. It is the second-largest private employer in the US, second-largest company in the US by revenue as of 2024 (after Walmart), and the largest company in the world by revenue as of 2026. As of October 2024, Amazon was the world's 12th-most visited website. 84% of its traffic comes from the US.

Amazon has been criticized for its alleged business practices, including surveillance partnerships, poor working conditions, anti-union efforts, environmental harm, anticompetitive behavior, censorship controversies, and exploitative treatment of small businesses and suppliers.

History

1994–2010

On July 5, 1994, Amazon was founded as "Cadabra" by Jeff Bezos, after he relocated from New York City to Bellevue, Washington, to operate an online bookstore. Bezos chose Seattle for its abundance of technical talent from Microsoft and the University of Washington, as well as its smaller population and the proximity to a major book distribution warehouse in Roseburg, Oregon. Seattle beat out Portland, Oregon and Boulder, Colorado.

In November 1994, Bezos renamed the company Amazon to reflect his ambitions for his company. (Amazon is the world's largest river.)

On July 16, 1995, the Amazon website launched, initially sourcing its books directly from wholesalers and publishers.

In May 1997, Amazon went public.

In 1998, Amazon began selling music and videos. It began international operations by acquiring online booksellers in the UK and Germany. In 1999, it expanded to sell more products, including music, video games, consumer electronics, home improvement items, software, games, and toys.

In 2000, US toy retailer Toys "R" Us entered into a 10-year agreement with Amazon, valued at $50 million per year plus a cut of sales, under which Toys "R" Us would be the exclusive supplier of toys and baby products on the service, and the chain's website would redirect to Amazon's Toys & Games category. In 2004, Toys "R" Us sued Amazon, claiming that because of a perceived lack of variety in Toys "R" Us stock, Amazon had knowingly allowed third-party sellers to offer items on the service in categories that Toys "R" Us had been granted exclusivity. In 2006, a court ruled in favor of Toys "R" Us, giving it the right to unwind its agreement with Amazon and establish its independent e-commerce website. The company was later awarded $51 million in damages.

In 2001, Amazon entered into a similar agreement with Borders, under which Amazon would comanage Borders.com as a co-branded service. Borders pulled out of the arrangement in 2007.

In 2002, the company launched Amazon Web Services (AWS), which initially focused on providing APIs for web developers to build web applications on top of Amazon's e-commerce platform. In 2004, AWS expanded to provide website popularity statistics and web crawler data from its Alexa Web Information Service. AWS later shifted toward providing enterprise services with Simple Storage Service (S3) in 2006, and Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) in 2008, allowing companies to rent data storage and computing power.

In 2006, Amazon launched the Fulfillment by Amazon program, which allowed individuals and small companies (called "third-party sellers") to sell products through Amazon's warehouses and fulfillment infrastructure.

In March 2008, Amazon bought Audible for about $300 million.

The AmazonBasics brand was introduced in 2009, offering a range of Amazon-branded products.

In June 2010, Amazon Seller Product Suggestions was launched.

2011–2020…