Amazon founders biography

On July 5, 1994, Princeton graduate and entrepreneur Jeff Bezos founds Cadabra—a twist on the magic word “Abracadabra”—which is initially just an online bookstore run out of his garage in Bellevue, Washington.

Bezos later changes the name to Amazon, and his site grows to become a global retail behemoth, an online "everything store" earning hundreds of millions in annual sales.

In 1995, Amazon went live on the world wide web, which was still in its early stages.

Amazon founders biography

Two years later, Amazon went public with an initial public offering (IPO). In 1999, Amazon moved beyond just selling books and began offering music and videos; then, in 2000, Amazon opened the website to third-party sellers.

In 2006, Amazon Web Services—which, as of 2024, provides a majority of Amazon’s operating profits—was launched to provide cloud-computing services.

Other Amazon milestones include the 2005 introduction of Amazon Prime, a subscription service that includes free, fast s