Highlights
- Jeff Bezos is resigning as the CEO of Amazon.
- Bezos has announced that he will become executive chairman of Amazon's executive board.
- Jeff Bezos will focus on his other ventures now.
In a surprise move, Amazon's Jeff Bezos has announced that he will be stepping down as the Amazon CEO -- a role that has pushed him to worldwide fame, and in the process also managed to change the fortunes of Amazon Inc over the years.
But announcing this move he also revealed that he is far from stepping away from Amazon itself as Bezos has announced that he will be taking the role of executive chairman of Amazon's executive board. While stepping down as the CEO of Amazon may look like retirement for Bezos, it won't exactly that as he has made it clear he is not looking for the same and that a move to executive chairman of the board at Amazon will give him time and energy to focus on his other ventures.
What next for Jeff Bezos?
As mentioned above, retirement is certainly not on Bezos' mind at the moment. In fact, this appears to be a career reboot of sorts for him as he will now attempt to maximise his holdings in the other company's he has founded or projects taken on over the last few years. Bezos is also well placed for any such move as he is currently valued at around $200 billion, and as such, has enough capital to fund not only his passions but then some more.
"As Exec Chair I will stay engaged in important Amazon initiatives but also have the time and energy I need to focus on the Day 1 Fund, the Bezos Earth Fund, Blue Origin, The Washington Post, and my other passions. I've never had more energy and this not about retiring. I'm super passionate about the impact I think these organisations can have." Bezos said in an email to Amazon employees.
Among these, Blue Origin is arguably the most interesting as it holds the potential to not only rival Elon Musk's SpaceX but also power the next NASA mission to the moon. Blue Origin was launched by Bezos in 2000 and has since done a lot of important work in the consumer space sector. One of the goals of the company is to make space travel more accessible by using reusable launch systems. It is also one of Bezos' childhood projects.
The other major project that he could focus on will be the charitable Day 1 Fund he started in 2018 along with his then-wife MacKenzie. This $2 billion investment aims to support homeless families and funding educational opportunities. The name "Day 1" comes from Bezos' principle of approaching every day with a first-day mentality, which the mogul applied to Amazon.
To remind our readers, Amazon has been Bezos's brainchild and under him, it has grown multifold. Over the decades, it has evolved from being an online bookseller into athe biggest e-commerce portal in the world, and much of what it has achieved has been down to Bezos' work. Many would now hope he can bring a similar change to the world with his many other ventures that he has been spending time on over the last few years.