Amazon turns 30: From bookselling to AI

On July 16, 1995, Jeff Bezos embarked on an adventure that would change the world: launching a platform initially designed to sell books online, which over the years has become a global shopping destination where you can buy anything. Thirty years later, the geeky entrepreneur has handed over leadership to Andy Jassy, while the company has evolved by investing in drones, cloud computing, and artificial intelligence. Amazon.com's birthday falls on July 16, one year after the company was incorporated in 1994, under the original name Cadabra. A young Bezos launched a site where you could buy paper books, which initially seemed to appeal only to a niche of tech users.

But after a year, he made the front page of the Wall Street Journal, and by 1997, Bezos was already a millionaire (the year the company went public). In 1998, the portal expanded overseas with the launch of Amazon UK and expanded into music. Less than twelve months later, the definitive acclaim came with the cover of Time magazine, crowning Bezos "Man of the Year."

The internet bubble of the early 2000s did not spare the company, but it overcame it by diversifying, launching the Marketplace through which millions of companies sell their products directly. Amazon was launched in Italy in 2010.

Meanwhile, the company has launched into multiple areas, from digital publishing with the Kindle to streaming and content production with Prime Video, from drone delivery to smart speakers, and of course, artificial intelligence. It launched Rufus, an AI assistant, is investing billions in data centers, and is betting on Google's rival, Anthropic. Currently, however, the company's cash injection comes from cloud computing: revenues from this division grew 17% year-over-year, reaching $29.3 billion.