Yahoo Finance Amazon's cloud unit CEO Adam Selipsky to step down
The CEO of Amazon's (AMZN) cloud computing business, Adam Selipsky, is stepping down next month, the company announced Tuesday, punctuating a phase of rapid growth at the division and a broader transition in a tech sector that is scrambling to capitalize on the coming AI-led era.
Matt Garman, senior vice president of sales and marketing at AWS, will replace Selipsky as CEO effective June 3, the company said.
Selipsky's departure comes at a high point for AWS. The cloud services unit is rapidly expanding and has reached a significant milestone of generating a $100 billion run rate. Amazon's broader artificial intelligence strategy runs through AWS, the industry's top cloud service by market share. During the company's most recent earnings report, executives said cloud customers are increasingly signing up for bigger deals with longer commitments, many with generative AI components.
Amazon stock was down just under 1% during morning trading.
"Given the state of the business and the leadership team, now is an appropriate moment for me to make this transition, and to take the opportunity to spend more time with family for a while, recharge a bit, and create some mental free space to reflect and consider the possibilities," Selipsky said. He took over AWS in 2021.
Selipsky, whose three-year tenure was defined by the pandemic, oversaw the business as companies were reeling from the disruptions of the public health crisis and pulled back from spending. But the cloud division has since posted swelling sales growth.
Last quarter revenue for AWS came in at $25 billion, beating analyst expectations and increasing about 17% compared to the same period last year.
"I’d like to thank Adam for everything he’s done to lead AWS over the past three years. He took over in the middle of the pandemic, which presented a wide array of leadership and business challenges," said Amazon CEO Andy Jassy in a note to employees Tuesday.
Garman has worked at Amazon for nearly 18 years, starting as an MBA intern in 2005 and becoming one of the first AWS product managers. He’d go on to serve in the same division as general manager of all AWS compute services and later as the head of sales and marketing. His career tracks the development of AWS, which has grown to become the company’s most profitable unit. That Amazon would appoint an AWS veteran to lead the key division highlights the importance of the role and the pivotal moment for the company.
Amazon, which has positioned itself as an AI leader, is among the tech giants racing to claim market share and launch new consumer services, largely based around its major cloud services business. Earlier this year, Amazon increased its investment in the AI startup Anthropic, committing another $2.75 billion to bring its investment total to $4 billion.
Hamza Shaban is a reporter for Yahoo Finance covering markets and the economy. Follow Hamza on Twitter @hshaban.
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