Jeff Bezos

Jeffrey Preston Bezos (born January 12, 1964) is the president, chief executive officer, and chairman of the board of Amazon.com. Bezos, a Phi Beta Kappa graduate of Princeton University, worked as a financial analyst for D.E. Shaw before founding Amazon.com in 1994. He was TIME magazine's Person of the Year in 1999.

Early career

After graduation, Jeff Bezos found employment on Wall Street, where computer science was increasingly in demand to study market trends. He went to work at Fitel, a start-up company that was building a network to conduct international trade. He stayed in the finance realm with Bankers Trust, rising to a Vice Presidency.

Related Topics:
Employment - Wall Street - Market trends - Fitel - International trade - Finance - Bankers Trust

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At D. E. Shaw, a firm specializing in the application of computer science to the stock market, Bezos was hired as much for his overall talent as for any particular assignment. While working at Shaw, Jeff met his wife, Mackenzie, also a Princeton graduate. He rose quickly at Shaw, becoming a senior vice president, and looked forward to a bright career in finance, when he made a discovery that changed his life, and the course of business history.

Related Topics:
Stock market - Finance

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By 1994, the World Wide Web had begun to be known outside the narrow circles of computer science researchers and physicists, but there was no Web commerce to speak of. One day that spring, Jeffrey Bezos observed that Web usage was increasing by 2,300 percent a year. He saw an opportunity for a new sphere of commerce, and immediately began considering the possibilities.

Related Topics:
1994 - World Wide Web

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