"
data-check-event-based-preview=""
data-is-vertical-video-embed="false"
data-network-id=""
data-publish-date="2019-02-14T20:28:17Z"
data-video-section="business"
data-canonical-url="https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2019/02/14/amazon-hq2-cancels-long-island-city-new-york-orig.cnn-business"
data-branding-key=""
data-video-slug="amazon hq2 cancels long island city new york orig"
data-first-publish-slug="amazon hq2 cancels long island city new york orig"
data-video-tags="amazon.com inc,companies,continents and regions,new york (state),new york city,north america,northeastern united states,queens (new york),the americas,united states"
data-details="">
"
data-check-event-based-preview=""
data-is-vertical-video-embed="false"
data-network-id=""
data-publish-date="2019-02-14T20:28:17Z"
data-video-section="business"
data-canonical-url="https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2019/02/14/amazon-hq2-cancels-long-island-city-new-york-orig.cnn-business"
data-branding-key=""
data-video-slug="amazon hq2 cancels long island city new york orig"
data-first-publish-slug="amazon hq2 cancels long island city new york orig"
data-video-tags="amazon.com inc,companies,continents and regions,new york (state),new york city,north america,northeastern united states,queens (new york),the americas,united states"
data-details="">
"
data-check-event-based-preview=""
data-is-vertical-video-embed="false"
data-network-id=""
data-publish-date="2022-04-04T15:31:07Z"
data-video-section="business"
data-canonical-url="https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2022/04/04/amazon-labor-union-new-york-hln-vpx.cnnbusiness"
data-branding-key=""
data-video-slug="amazon labor union new york hln vpx"
data-first-publish-slug="amazon labor union new york hln vpx"
data-video-tags="amazon rainforest,amazon river,amazon.com inc,brazil,business and industry sectors,business, economy and trade,companies,continents and regions,labor and employment,labor relations,labor unions,latin america,new york (state),new york city,north america,northeastern united states,physical locations,rivers, lakes and falls (by name),south america,staten island,the americas,transportation and warehousing,united states,warehouse storage"
data-details="">
"
data-check-event-based-preview=""
data-is-vertical-video-embed="false"
data-network-id=""
data-publish-date="2022-03-30T15:56:36Z"
data-video-section="business"
data-canonical-url="https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2022/03/30/land-of-the-giants-jeff-bezos-nerd-ron-origseriesfilms.cnn"
data-branding-key="cnn-plus"
data-video-slug="land of the giants jeff bezos nerd ron origseriesfilms"
data-first-publish-slug="land of the giants jeff bezos nerd ron origseriesfilms"
data-video-tags="business figures,jeff bezos,amazon.com inc,companies,technology,alphabet inc,apple inc,google inc"
data-details="">
Video Ad Feedback
Nerdy, geek: Friends describe Jeff Bezos in his 20s
"
data-check-event-based-preview=""
data-is-vertical-video-embed="false"
data-network-id=""
data-publish-date="2022-03-30T15:56:41Z"
data-video-section="business"
data-canonical-url="https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2022/03/30/land-of-the-giants-amazon-books-ron-origseriesfilms.cnn"
data-branding-key="cnn-plus"
data-video-slug="land of the giants amazon books ron origseriesfilms"
data-first-publish-slug="land of the giants amazon books ron origseriesfilms"
data-video-tags="amazon.com inc,books and reading,business and industry sectors,business, economy and trade,cnn,companies,leisure and lifestyle,retail and wholesale trade,specialty store,technology"
data-details="">
Video Ad Feedback
'They're letting the fox into the hen house': How Bezos sold books to start his empire
"
data-check-event-based-preview=""
data-is-vertical-video-embed="false"
data-network-id=""
data-publish-date="2021-11-18T13:01:32Z"
data-video-section="business"
data-canonical-url="https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2021/11/18/aws-ceo-adam-selipsky-amazon-cloud-computing-gr-orig.cnn"
data-branding-key=""
data-video-slug="aws ceo adam selipsky amazon cloud computing gr_orig"
data-first-publish-slug="aws ceo adam selipsky amazon cloud computing gr_orig"
data-video-tags="amazon.com inc,business and industry sectors,business, economy and trade,cloud computing,companies,computer science and information technology,internet and www,technology"
data-details="">
Video Ad Feedback
Hear why Amazon is opening a free cloud training center
"
data-check-event-based-preview=""
data-is-vertical-video-embed="false"
data-network-id=""
data-publish-date="2021-10-21T12:41:25Z"
data-video-section="business"
data-canonical-url="https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2021/10/21/jennifer-bates-amazon-union-rt-orig.cnn"
data-branding-key="risk-takers"
data-video-slug="jennifer bates amazon union rt orig"
data-first-publish-slug="jennifer bates amazon union rt orig"
data-video-tags="alabama,amazon.com inc,business and industry sectors,business, economy and trade,companies,compensation and benefits,continents and regions,demographic groups,females (demographic group),labor and employment,labor relations,labor unions,north america,population and demographics,society,southeastern united states,the americas,transportation and warehousing,united states,wages and salaries,warehouse storage"
data-details="">
Video Ad Feedback
Low wages & high quotas: Hear why this Alabama woman took on Amazon
"
data-check-event-based-preview=""
data-is-vertical-video-embed="false"
data-network-id=""
data-publish-date="2021-07-05T10:59:15Z"
data-video-section="business"
data-canonical-url="https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2021/07/02/amazon-after-jeff-bezos-pkg.cnnbusiness"
data-branding-key=""
data-video-slug="amazon after jeff bezos pkg"
data-first-publish-slug="amazon after jeff bezos pkg"
data-video-tags="amazon.com inc,andy jassy,antitrust and trade law,business figures,business, economy and trade,clare sebastian,companies,economic policy,economy and economic indicators,jeff bezos,law and legal system,misc people,trade and development,trade regulation and policy"
data-details="">
Video Ad Feedback
Amazon's new CEO faces antitrust and worker pressure
"
data-check-event-based-preview=""
data-is-vertical-video-embed="false"
data-network-id=""
data-publish-date="2021-06-02T13:46:38Z"
data-video-section="business"
data-canonical-url="https://www.cnn.com/videos/business/2021/06/02/amazon-marijuana-time-off.cnnbusiness"
data-branding-key=""
data-video-slug="amazon marijuana time off"
data-first-publish-slug="amazon marijuana time off"
data-video-tags="amazon.com inc,clare sebastian,companies,controlled substances,crime, law enforcement and corrections,criminal law,decriminalization,drug policy,drugs and society,law and legal system,marijuana,marijuana legalization,misc people,society"
data-details="">
Video Ad Feedback
Amazon changes marijuana and time off policies
02:19
Now playing
- Source:
CNNBusiness
New YorkCNN Business
—
In his annual letter to shareholders, Jeff Bezos said Amazon’s biggest successes have come from failures.
The sentiment is a popular trope from Big Tech companies and startups.Now Bezos is getting candid about what his company has learned from some of its biggest missteps.
“Amazon will be experimenting at the right scale for a company of our size if we occasionally have multibillion-dollar failures,” Bezos wrote in the letter. “Of course, we won’t undertake such experiments cavalierly. We will work hard to make them good bets, but not all good bets will ultimately pay out.”
As a company grows, everything will need to scale, including the size of failed experiments, he wrote. Bezos often shares thoughts, analysis and glimpses into future plans in his annual shareholders letter, which started in 1997.
In the letter, he pointed to examples of growing pains. After the 2014 launch of the Fire Phone – the company’s biggest financial failure – Amazon found major success with its smart speaker Echo. The products were developed around the same time.
Bezos said the company was ultimately able to take what it learned from the Fire phone failure and accelerate its Echo efforts and development for its voice assistant Alexa.
“The good news for shareowners is that a single big winning bet can more than cover the cost of many losers,” he said.
This year’s letter began by highlighting the growth in Amazon’s third-party sellers. Sales from small and medium-sized businesses have grown to $160 billion in 2018 from $0.1 billion in 1999.
“Third-party sellers are kicking our first party butt. Badly,” Bezos said.
Bezos also detailed the struggle behind building its cashier-less Amazon Go stores. Customers check in with an app, grab products off the shelves and walk out when they’re done shopping. Amazon Go now has 10 locations.
“Getting there was hard. Technically hard,” Bezos said. “We had to design and build our own proprietary cameras and shelves and invent new computer vision algorithms, including the ability to stitch together imagery from hundreds of cooperating cameras. And we had to do it in a way where the technology worked so well that it simply receded into the background, invisible.”
Bezos touched on the origins of Amazon’s cloud computing service, AWS.
“No one asked for AWS. No one,” Bezos said. “Turns out the world was in fact ready and hungry for an offering like AWS but didn’t know it. We had a hunch, followed our curiosity, took the necessary financial risks, and began building – reworking, experimenting, and iterating countless times as we proceeded.”
AWS now has millions of customers, including startups, nonprofits, government entities and major companies.
Bezos also challenged its top retail competitors, without naming specific companies, to match Amazon’s employee benefits and its $15 minimum wage.
“Do it! Better yet, go to $16 and throw the gauntlet back at us. It’s a kind of competition that will benefit everyone,” he said.
Dan Bartlett, Walmart’s executive vice president of corporate affairs, shot back at Amazon on Twitter. He shared an article about Amazon paying $0 in federal taxes last year and wrote: “Hey retail competitors out there (you know who you are) how about paying your taxes?”
According to an SEC filing on Wednesday, Bezos made a salary of $81,840 last year – a number that hasn’t changed for two decades. Although he’s never taken stock awards, he owns 16% of Amazon and is the richest person in the world.