Amazon Web Services (AWS) proved its market dominance this quarter, posting $33bn in revenue even after a major global outage. The 20% year-over-year growth was the division’s fastest since 2022 and beat Wall Street’s $32.42bn estimate.
The outage, which affected millions, seems to have had no impact on the division’s bottom line. This resilience powered Amazon’s overall strong quarter, which saw total revenues hit $180.17bn, also beating forecasts.
The positive report sent Amazon’s stock up 9%. The company used the earnings call to discuss its push into AI, where it is competing with rivals like Google and Microsoft. Executives mentioned the Rufus shopping assistant and Zoox robotaxis as key projects.
This financial success story was delivered alongside the news of 14,000 corporate job cuts.
CEO Andy Jassy gave a surprising rationale, claiming the cuts were “not really AI-driven” but were a “culture” decision. He stated the goal was to “operate like the world’s largest startup.”