AMAZON COM INC 10-K

Item 1. Business This Annual Report on Form 10-K and the documents incorporated herein by reference contain forward-looking statements based on expectations, estimates, and projections as of the date of this filing. Actual results may differ materially from those expressed in forward-looking statements. See Item 1A of Part I — “Risk Factors.” Amazon.com, Inc.’s principal corporate offices are located in Seattle, Washington. We completed our initial public offering in May 1997 and our common stock is listed on the Nasdaq Global Select Market under the symbol “AMZN.” As used herein, “Amazon.com,” “we,” “our,” and similar terms include Amazon.com, Inc. and its subsidiaries, unless the context indicates otherwise. General We seek to be Earth’s most customer-centric company. We are guided by four principles: customer obsession rather than competitor focus, passion for invention, commitment to operational excellence, and long-term thinking. In each of our segments, we serve our primary customer sets, consisting of consumers, sellers, developers, enterprises, and content creators. In addition, we provide services, such as advertising to sellers, vendors, publishers, authors, and others, through programs such as sponsored ads, display, and video advertising. We have organized our operations into three segments: North America, International, and Amazon Web Services (“AWS”). These segments reflect the way the Company evaluates its business performance and manages its operations. Information on our net sales is contained in Item 8 of Part II, “Financial Statements and Supplementary Data — Note 10 — Segment Information.” Consumers We serve consumers through our online and physical stores and focus on selection, price, and convenience. We design our stores to enable hundreds of millions of unique products to be sold by us and by third parties across dozens of product categories. Customers access our offerings through our websites, mobile apps, Alexa, devices, streaming, and physically visiting our stores. We also manufacture and sell electronic devices, including Kindle, Fire tablet, Fire TV, Echo, Ring, and other devices, and we develop and produce media content. We seek to offer our customers low prices, fast and free delivery, easy-to-use functionality, and timely customer service. In addition, we offer Amazon Prime, a membership program that includes unlimited free shipping on over 100 million items, access to unlimited streaming of tens of thousands of movies and TV episodes, including Amazon Original content, and other benefits. We fulfill customer orders in a number of ways, including through: North America and International fulfillment networks that we operate; co-sourced and outsourced arrangements in certain countries; digital delivery; and through our physical stores. We operate customer service centers globally, which are supplemented by co-sourced arrangements. See Item 2 of Part I, “Properties.” Sellers We offer programs that enable sellers to grow their businesses, sell their products in our stores, and fulfill orders through us. We are not the seller of record in these transactions. We earn fixed fees, a percentage of sales, per-unit activity fees, interest, or some combination thereof, for our seller programs. Developers and Enterprises We serve developers and enterprises of all sizes, including start-ups, government agencies, and academic institutions, through AWS, which offers a broad set of on-demand technology services, including compute, storage, database, analytics, and machine learning, and other services. Content Creators We serve authors and independent publishers with Kindle Direct Publishing, an online service that lets independent authors and publishers choose a royalty option and make their books available in the Kindle Store, along with Amazon’s own publishing arm, Amazon Publishing. We also offer programs that allow authors, musicians, filmmakers, skill and app developers, and others to publish and sell content. 3 Table of Contents Competition Our businesses encompass a large variety of product types, service offerings, and delivery channels. The worldwide marketplace in which we compete is evolving rapidly and intensely competitive, and we face a broad array of competitors from many different industry sectors around the world. Our current and potential competitors include: (1) physical, e-commerce, and omnichannel retailers, publishers, vendors, distributors, manufacturers, and producers of the products we offer and sell to consumers and businesses; (2) publishers, producers, and distributors of physical, digital, and interactive media of all types and all distribution channels; (3) web search engines, comparison shopping websites, social networks, web portals, and other online and app-based means of discovering, using, or acquiring goods and services, either directly or in collaboration with other retailers; (4) companies that provide e-commerce services, including website development and hosting, omnichannel sales, inventory and supply chain management, advertising, fulfillment, customer service, and payment processing; (5) companies that provide fulfillment and logistics services for themselves or for third parties, whether online or offline; (6) companies that provide information technology services or products, including on-premises or cloud-based infrastructure and other services; (7) companies that design, manufacture, market, or sell consumer electronics, telecommunication, and electronic devices; (8) companies that sell grocery products online and in physical stores; and (9) companies that provide advertising services, whether in digital or other formats. We believe that the principal competitive factors in our retail businesses include selection, price, and convenience, including fast and reliable fulfillment. Additional competitive factors for our seller and enterprise services include the quality, speed, and reliability of our services and tools, as well as customers’ ability and willingness to change business practices. Some of our current and potential competitors have greater resources, longer histories, more customers, greater brand recognition, and greater control over inputs critical to our various businesses. They may secure better terms from suppliers, adopt more aggressive pricing, pursue restrictive distribution agreements that restrict our access to supply, direct consumers to their own offerings instead of ours, lock-in potential customers with restrictive terms, and devote more resources to technology, infrastructure, fulfillment, and marketing. The Internet facilitates competitive entry and comparison shopping, which enhances the ability of new, smaller, or lesser-known businesses to compete against us. Each of our businesses is also subject to rapid change and the development of new business models and the entry of new and well-funded competitors. Other companies also may enter into business combinations or alliances that strengthen their competitive positions. Intellectual Property We regard our trademarks, service marks, copyrights, patents, domain names, trade dress, trade secrets, proprietary technologies, and similar intellectual property as critical to our success, and we rely on trademark, copyright, and patent law, trade-secret protection, and confidentiality and/or license agreements with our employees, customers, partners, and others to protect our proprietary rights. We have registered, or applied for the registration of, a number of U.S. and international domain names, trademarks, service marks, and copyrights. Additionally, we have filed U.S. and international patent applications covering certain of our proprietary technology. Seasonality Our business is affected by seasonality, which historically has resulted in higher sales volume during our fourth quarter, which ends December 31. Human Capital Our employees are critical to our mission of being Earth’s most customer-centric company. As of December 31, 2020, we employed approximately 1,298,000 full-time and part-time employees. Additionally, we utilize independent contractors and temporary personnel to supplement our workforce. Competition for qualified personnel has historically been intense, particularly for software engineers, computer scientists, and other technical staff. We focus on investment and innovation, inclusion and diversity, safety, and engagement to hire and develop the best talent. We rely on numerous and evolving initiatives to implement these objectives and invent mechanisms for talent development, including industry-leading pay and benefits, skills training programs such as Amazon Career Choice and the Amazon Technical Academy, mentorship and support resources, and programs that advance engagement, communication, and feedback. Available Information Our investor relations website is amazon.com/ir and we encourage investors to use it as a way of easily finding information about us. We promptly make available on this website, free of charge, the reports that we file or furnish with the Securities and Exchange Commission (“SEC”), corporate governance information (including our Code of Business Conduct and Ethics), and select press releases. 4 Table of Contents Executive Officers and Directors The following tables set forth certain information regarding our Executive Officers and Directors as of January 20, 2021: Information About Our Executive Officers Name Age Position Jeffrey P. Bezos 57 President, Chief Executive Officer, and Chairman of the Board David H. Clark 48 CEO, Worldwide Consumer Andrew R. Jassy 53 CEO Amazon Web Services Brian T. Olsavsky 57 Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer Shelley L. Reynolds 56 Vice President, Worldwide Controller, and Principal Accounting Officer David A. Zapolsky 57 Senior Vice President, General Counsel, and Secretary Jeffrey P. Bezos. Mr. Bezos has been Chairman of the Board of Amazon.com since founding it in 1994 and Chief Executive Officer since May 1996. Mr. Bezos served as President of the Company from founding until June 1999 and again from October 2000 to the present. David H. Clark. Mr. Clark has served as CEO Worldwide Consumer since January 2021, and Senior Vice President, Worldwide Operations, from May 2014 until January 2021. Andrew R. Jassy. Mr. Jassy has served as CEO Amazon Web Services since April 2016, and Senior Vice President, Amazon Web Services, from April 2006 until April 2016. Brian T. Olsavsky. Mr. Olsavsky has served as Senior Vice President and Chief Financial Officer since June 2015, Vice President, Finance for the Global Consumer Business from December 2011 to June 2015, and numerous financial leadership roles across Amazon with global responsibility since April 2002. Shelley L. Reynolds. Ms. Reynolds has served as Vice President, Worldwide Controller, and Principal Accounting Officer since April 2007. David A. Zapolsky. Mr. Zapolsky has served as Senior Vice President, General Counsel, and Secretary since May 2014, Vice President, General Counsel, and Secretary from September 2012 to May 2014, and as Vice President and Associate General Counsel for Litigation and Regulatory matters from April 2002 until September 2012. Board of Directors Name Age Position Jeffrey P. Bezos 57 President, Chief Executive Officer, and Chairman of the Board Keith B. Alexander 69 Co-CEO, President, and Chair of IronNet Cybersecurity, Inc. Rosalind G. Brewer 58 Group President, Americas and Chief Operating Officer, Starbucks Corporation Jamie S. Gorelick 70 Partner, Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr LLP Daniel P. Huttenlocher 62 Dean, MIT Schwarzman College of Computing Judith A. McGrath 68 Former Chair and CEO, MTV Networks Indra K. Nooyi 65 Former Chief Executive Officer, PepsiCo, Inc. Jonathan J. Rubinstein 64 Former co-CEO, Bridgewater Associates, LP Thomas O. Ryder 76 Retired, Former Chair, Reader’s Digest Association, Inc. Patricia Q. Stonesifer 64 Former President and Chief Executive Officer, Martha’s Table Wendell P. Weeks 61 Chief Executive Officer, Corning Incorporated 5 Table of Contents