Jeff Bezos 1

Jeff Bezos

Jeff Bezos

Jeff Bezos 2010

Born Jeffrey Preston JorgensenJanuary 12, 1964Albuquerque, New Mexico, U.S.

Alma mater Princeton University

Occupation Chairman and CEO of Amazon.com

Net worth US$ 23.2 billion (2012)[1]

Spouse(s) Mackenzie Bezos (m. 1993)[2]

Awards Time Person of the Year 1999

Jeffrey Preston "Jeff" Bezos (/ˈbeɪzəs/; born January 12, 1964) is an American entrepreneur who played a key rolein the growth of e-commerce as the founder and CEO of Amazon.com, Inc., an online merchant of books and later ofa wide variety of products. Under his guidance, Amazon.com became the largest retailer on the World Wide Weband the model for Internet sales.

Early life and careerBezos was born Jeffrey Preston Jorgensen in Albuquerque, New Mexico, to Jacklyn Gise Jorgensen and TedJorgensen.[3] His maternal ancestors were settlers who lived in Texas, and over the generations acquired a 25,000acre (101 km2 or 39 miles2) ranch in Cotulla. Bezos' maternal grandfather was a regional director of the U.S. AtomicEnergy Commission in Albuquerque. He retired early to the ranch, where Bezos spent many summers as a youth,working with him.[4] At an early age, Bezos displayed a striking mechanical aptitude – as a toddler, he trieddismantling his crib.[5]

Bezos was born to a teenage mother in Albuquerque. Her marriage to his father lasted little more than a year. When Jeff was five, she remarried, this time to Miguel Bezos. Miguel was born in Cuba, migrated to the United States alone when he was fifteen years old, worked his way through the University of Albuquerque, married, and legally adopted Jeff. After the marriage, the family moved to Houston, Texas, and Miguel became an engineer for Exxon. The young Bezos attended River Oaks Elementary School in Houston from fourth to sixth grade. As a child, he spent

Jeff Bezos 2

summers at his grandfather's ranch in southern Texas, "laying pipe, vaccinating cattle and fixing windmills."[6]

Bezos often showed intense scientific interests. He rigged an electric alarm to keep his younger siblings out of hisroom. He converted his parents' garage into a laboratory for science projects. The family moved to Miami, Florida,where Bezos attended Miami Palmetto Senior High School. While in high school, he attended the Student ScienceTraining Program [7] at the University of Florida, receiving a Silver Knight Award in 1982.[8] He was high schoolvaledictorian.[9] He attended Princeton University, planning to study physics, but soon returned to his love ofcomputers and graduated summa cum laude, having been elected to honor societies Phi Beta Kappa and Tau Beta Pi,with a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering and computer science.According to Nick Hanauer (an early investor in Amazon) and "others who know [him]",[6] Bezos is described as alibertarian.[6] In July 2012, Bezos and his wife personally donated $2.5 million to help pass a same-sex marriagereferendum in Washington.[10]

Business careerAfter graduating from Princeton University in 1986, Bezos worked on Wall Street in the computer science field.[11]

Then he worked on building a network for international trade for a company known as Fitel. He next worked atBankers Trust, where he became vice-president. Later on he also worked in computer science for D. E. Shaw & Co.

Amazon.comBezos founded Amazon.com in 1994 after making a cross-country drive from New York to Seattle, writing up theAmazon business plan on the way. He initially set up the company in his garage.[12] He had left his "well-payingjob" for a New York City hedge fund when he "learned about the rapid growth in Internet use", which coincided witha "then-new U.S. Supreme Court ruling [that] online retailers don't have to collect sales taxes in states where theylack a physical presence"; he had headed to Washington because its relatively small population meant fewer of hisfuture customers would have to pay sales tax.[6]

According to Forbes, Amazon's shares have "defied gravity" in 2011, jumping 55% and adding $6.5 billion to his networth.[13]

Bezos is known for his attention to business details. As described by Portfolio.com, he "is at once a happy-go-luckymogul and a notorious micromanager. ... an executive who wants to know about everything from contract minutiaeto how he is quoted in all Amazon press releases."[12]

Blue OriginIn 2000, Bezos founded Blue Origin, a human spaceflight startup company,[14] partially as a result of his fascinationwith space travel,[15] including an early interest in developing "space hotels, amusement parks and colonies for 2million or 3 million people orbiting the Earth."[9] The company was kept under wraps for a half dozen years andinitially became publicly known only in 2006 when purchasing a sizable aggregation of land in west Texas for alaunch and test facility.[16]

In a 2011 interview, Bezos indicated that he founded the space company to help enable "anybody to go into space"and stated that the company is committed to decreasing the cost and increasing the safety of spaceflight.[17] BlueOrigin is "one of several start-ups aiming to open up space travel to paying customers. Like Amazon, the company issecretive, but [in September 2011] revealed that it had lost an unmanned prototype vehicle during a short-hop [sic]test flight. Although this was a setback, the announcement of the loss revealed for the first time just how far BlueOrigin’s team had advanced."[15] Bezos said that the crash was 'not the outcome that any of us wanted, but we'resigned up for this to be hard.'" [15]

Jeff Bezos 3

RecognitionHe was named Time magazine's Person of the Year in 1999.[18] In 2008, he was selected by U.S. News & WorldReport as one of America's best leaders.[19] Bezos was awarded an honorary doctorate in Science and Technologyfrom Carnegie Mellon University in 2008. In 2011, The Economist gave Bezos and Gregg Zehr an Innovation Awardfor the Amazon Kindle.[20] In 2012, Bezos was named Businessperson of The Year by Fortune Magazine.[21]

He is also a member of the Bilderberg Group and attended the Swiss 2011 Bilderberg conference in St. Moritz,Switzerland.[22] He is a member of the Executive Committee of The Business Council for 2011 and 2012.[23] As ofOctober 2012, According to the Bloomberg Billionaires Index [24] Bezos is listed as one of the wealthiest people inthe world with an estimated net worth of US 22.1 billion. [25] He was recently ranked the second best CEO in worldby Harvard Business Review, after the late Steve Jobs of Apple, therefore making him the best living CEO.

References[1] Jeff Bezos (http:/ / www. forbes. com/ profile/ jeff-bezos/ ) Forbes.com. Retrieved September 2012.[2] Wired. http:/ / www. wired. com/ wired/ archive/ 7. 03/ bezos_pr. html.[3] Robinson, Tom (2009). Jeff Bezos: Amazon.com Architect (http:/ / books. google. ca/ books?id=tONgujxtvPwC& pg=PA14& lpg=PA14&

dq="jeffrey+ Preston+ Jorgensen+ "#v=onepage& q& f=false). ABDO. p. 14. ISBN 978-1-60453-759-8. .[4] Biography and Video Interview of Jeff Bezos at Academy of Achievement. (http:/ / www. achievement. org/ autodoc/ page/ bez0int-1)[5] Hof, Robert D. (December 14, 1998). "The torrent of energy behind Amazon" (http:/ / www. businessweek. com/ 1998/ 50/ b3608008. htm).

Businessweek. .[6] Martinez, Amy; Heim, Kristi (March 31, 2012). "Amazon a virtual no-show in hometown philanthropy" (http:/ / seattletimes. nwsource. com/

html/ businesstechnology/ 2017883663_amazonmain25. html). The Seattle Times. . Retrieved 2012-04-01.[7] http:/ / www. cpet. ufl. edu/ sstp/ default. html[8] "Miami-Dade Winners" (http:/ / web. archive. org/ web/ 20081121073505/ http:/ / www. silverknightawards. com/ dade_winners. html).

Silver Knight Awards. Archived from the original (http:/ / www. silverknightawards. com/ dade_winners. html) on November 21, 2008. .[9] Martinez, Amy (201-03-31). l "Amazon.com's Bezos invests in space travel, time" (http:/ / seattletimes. nwsource. com/ html/

businesstechnology/ 2017883721_amazonbezos25. htm). Seattle Times. l. Retrieved 2012-04-23.[10] Shear, Micheal D. (July 27, 2012). "Amazon's Founder Pledges $2.5 Million in Support of Same Sex Marriage" (http:/ / thecaucus. blogs.

nytimes. com/ 2012/ 07/ 27/ amazons-founder-pledges-2-5-million-in-support-of-same-sex-marriage/ #more-224851). New York Times. .[11] "Tau Beta Pi Leaders and Innovators" (http:/ / www. tbp. org/ pages/ About/ People/ DistinguishedMembers/ Business. cfm). The Tau Beta

Pi Association. .[12] "Top Executive Profiles - Jeffrey P. Bezos" (http:/ / web. archive. org/ web/ 20090204204126/ http:/ / www. portfolio. com/ resources/

executive-profiles/ Jeffrey-P-Bezos-1984). Portfolio.com. Archived from the original (http:/ / www. portfolio. com/ resources/executive-profiles/ Jeffrey-P-Bezos-1984) on February 4, 2009. .

[13] O'Connor, Clare (September 29, 2011). "Jeff Bezos: Amazon's Rocket Man Keeps Getting Richer" (http:/ / www. forbes. com/ sites/clareoconnor/ 2011/ 09/ 22/ jeff-bezos-amazons-rocket-man-keeps-getting-richer/ ). Forbes. .

[14] Boyle, Alan (2006-11-11). "Blue Origin Revealed" (http:/ / cosmiclog. msnbc. msn. com/ archive/ 2007/ 01/ 03/ 26062. aspx).cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com. . Retrieved 2011-12-09.

[15] "Taking the long view: Jeff Bezos, the founder and chief executive of Amazon, owes much of his success to his ability to look beyond theshort-term view of things" (http:/ / www. economist. com/ node/ 21548487). Technology Quarterly. 2012-03-03. . Retrieved 2012-03-03. "MrBezos’s willingness to take a long-term view also explains his fascination with space travel, and his decision to found a secretive companycalled Blue Origin, one of several start-ups now building spacecraft with private funding."

[16] Mylene Mangalindan (2006-11-10). "Buzz in West Texas is about Jeff Bezos space craft launch site" (http:/ / online. wsj. com/ article/SB116312683235519444. html?mod=googlenews_wsj). The Wall Street Journal. . Retrieved 2008-05-28.

[17] Levy, Stephen (2011-11-13). "Jeff Bezos Owns the Web in More Ways Than You Think" (http:/ / www. wired. com/ magazine/ 2011/ 11/ff_bezos/ all/ 1). Wired. . Retrieved 2011-12-09.

[18] Cooper Ramo, Joshua (December 27, 1999). "Jeffrey Preston Bezos: 1999 Person of the year" (http:/ / www. time. com/ time/ archive/preview/ 0,10987,992927,00. html). Time Magazine. .

[19] LaGesse, David (November 19, 2008). "America's Best Leaders: Jeff Bezos, Amazon.com CEO" (http:/ / www. usnews. com/ articles/ news/best-leaders/ 2008/ 11/ 19/ americas-best-leaders-jeff-bezos-amazoncom-ceo. html). U.S. News & World Report. . Retrieved 2008-11-25.

[20] "Charging ahead: e-book design and popularity win Kindle creators Innovation Award" (http:/ / www. economistconferences. co. uk/press-release/ charging-ahead-e-book-design-and-popularity-win-kindle-creators-innovation-award/ 5908). The Economist. September 19,2011. .

[21] "Amazon's Jeff Bezos: The ultimate disrupter" (http:/ / management. fortune. cnn. com/ 2012/ 11/ 16/ jeff-bezos-amazon/ ). .[22] "Bilderberg 2011 list of participants" (http:/ / www. bilderbergmeetings. org/ participants_2011. html). BilderbergMeetings.org. . Retrieved

August 24, 2011.

Jeff Bezos 4

[23] The Business Council, Official website, Executive Committee (http:/ / www. thebusinesscouncil. org/ about/ excommittee. aspx)[24] http:/ / topics. bloomberg. com/ bloomberg-billionaires-index/[25] "Bloomberg Billionares Index" (http:/ / topics. bloomberg. com/ bloomberg-billionaires-index/ ). Bloomberg LP. . Retrieved December 2,

20122.

External links• Jeff Bezos (http:/ / www. ted. com/ speakers/ jeff_bezos. html/ ) at TED• Appearances (http:/ / www. c-spanvideo. org/ jeffbezos) on C-SPAN• Jeff Bezos (http:/ / www. charlierose. com/ guest/ view/ 2618) on Charlie Rose• Jeff Bezos (http:/ / www. imdb. com/ name/ nm1757263/ ) at the Internet Movie Database• Works by or about Jeff Bezos (http:/ / worldcat. org/ identities/ lccn-n99-280137) in libraries (WorldCat catalog)• Jeff Bezos (http:/ / topics. nytimes. com/ top/ reference/ timestopics/ people/ b/ jeffrey_p_bezos/ index. html)

collected news and commentary at The New York Times• Jeff Bezos (http:/ / www. nndb. com/ people/ 436/ 000022370) at the Notable Names Database• Condé Nast Portfolio Executive Profile - Portfolio.com (August 2007) (http:/ / www. portfolio. com/ resources/

executive-profiles/ 1984)• Inside the Mind of Jeff Bezos - Fastcompany.com (August 2004) (http:/ / www. fastcompany. com/ magazine/ 85/

bezos_1. html)

Article Sources and Contributors 5

Article Sources and ContributorsJeff Bezos  Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=534416234  Contributors: 2001:558:6045:A0:391F:B005:179D:8DD9, ALargeElk, Aaaeditor, AaronTovo, Acro, Adam9389,Adhanali, Aditayade, Ageekgal, Airwolf, Alan Liefting, AlanUS, Alansohn, AlexPlank, Alexf, Alexjohnc3, All Hallow's Wraith, Allens, Alphacatmarnie, Andyzweb, Anthony717, Arunsingh16,Atlant, B. Fairbairn, Back ache, Bejnar, Beland, Bender235, Betacommand, Bkonrad, Bloch1, Bobblewik, Bongwarrior, Braincricket, Brandizzi, Brandon39, Brewcrewer, Brittanydanielle08,Bubbachuck, Bunnyhop11, Burntsauce, Bushido Hacks, CRKingston, CambridgeBayWeather, Camerong, Captain Proton, CaptainG, Caracaskid, Casey56, ChangChienFu, Cinderelly007,Cjcollier, Courcelles, CowboySpartan, Crockspot, Crohnie, Cst17, CubanellePep, Cyanidethistles, D6, DARTH SIDIOUS 2, Dabomb87, Danno uk, Dbmoore, Dcattell, Dddog18, DeansFA,Dhull, Dismas, Donfbreed, Donreed, Donwilson, DraQue Star, ESkog, EconoPhysicist, Edward, Emeraldcityserendipity, Emerson7, Emhoo, Epbr123, Euchiasmus, Evannewman, Excirial,Exeunt, Exploding Toenails, Falcon8765, Farquaadhnchmn, Figaro, Flamurai, Flatterworld, Floquenbeam, Florentyna, Flowanda, Frecklefoot, Fredrik, Fæ, Gamaliel, Ghotiheir, Gimeral,GinaDana, Glennf, GoingBatty, Graham87, Greg Salter, Guoguo914, Gurch, Hallows AG, HallucigeniaUK, Happynoodleboycey, Happypotatoman, Headbomb, Hellznrg, Heroeswithmetaphors,Hu12, Hut 8.5, IRelayer, IanOsgood, Imroy, Ipatrol, Irishguy, JHMM13, James086, Jaranda, Jeffbezosnazitactics, Jeffbezosrules, Jg2904, Jmaquino65, Johnnyboyca, Jonathanleblang, Jonheal,JzG, Kapitanniemand, Karlhahn, Kbdank71, Kkm010, Koffie, Ktr101, Kuru, Leifern, Levineps, Liam Braithwaite, Lindsaybradshawmfg, Lockley, Lokpest, Loren.wilton, Lugia2453, Lukobe,LunaticFringe, MBisanz, MK8, MSGJ, Macrakis, Magioladitis, Mahithsuresh, MarekTT, Mat813, Matt Gies, Mav, Mb1000, Mediran, Mephistophelian, Miahavero, Michael Hardy, Mike R,Mikeboogie, Minesweeper, MinnaNoJorge8, Mrwojo, Mvgcrown, N2e, NPrice, NSR, Nasnema, Navy Blue, NawlinWiki, Neiboeneri, Neo139, NeuronExMachina, NightThree, Niteowlneils,Nixeagle, No Guru, NogginF, Nsaa, NubKnacker, NuclearWinner, Nv8200p, O.Koslowski, Olivier, Omicronpersei8, Omnipaedista, Onorem, Oo64eva, Ottawahitech, Ovelix, Oxymoron83,ParticleMan, Partyclams, Patricknoddy, PaulHanson, Penbat, Personman, Philip Trueman, Porfyrios, Pro bug catcher, R.123, RadioFan, Randhirreddy, Reaverdrop, RedWolf, Redleaf, Rekiwi,Retinarow, Richard Arthur Norton (1958- ), Rjwilmsi, Rktur, Ronincyberpunk, Rory096, Rudeerthanyou, Runningonbrains, SD6-Agent, Sadalmelik, Sageofwisdom, SatanicYakuza, Scjessey,Seaphoto, Semper discens, Shadowlynk, ShakataGaNai, Shervink, Shpoffo, Shunpiker, SimonP, SkyMachine, Smalljim, Some jerk on the Internet, Someguy1221, Somercet, Speciate,SpikeToronto, Spleen1666, Sspillers, Stefanomione, Stemonitis, Superflush, Swace, Syrthiss, TEB728, Targaryen, Technofreak90, Temabezrukov, Terence7, The wub, Thephilosopher,ThreeBlindMice, Threeafterthree, Tide rolls, Tim!, Todd Sattersten, TonyTheTiger, Tornadothrasher, Transclick, Tree Biting Conspiracy, Tregoweth, TreyHarris, Trivialist, Tyw7, UtherSRG,Varano, Venske, Vlad, VladGenie, Vulcanhacker, WVhybrid, WaltBusterkeys, Ward3001, WhisperToMe, White 720, WikHead, Wiki libs, Wikiwatcher1, Winhunter, Woohookitty, X444,XLR8TION, YUL89YYZ, Yngvadottir, Zigzig20s, Zippy, Zzuuzz, Τασουλα, ТимофейЛееСуда, 471 anonymous edits

Image Sources, Licenses and ContributorsFile:Jeff Bezos' iconic laugh.jpg  Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Jeff_Bezos'_iconic_laugh.jpg  License: Creative Commons Attribution 2.0  Contributors: SteveJurvetsonFile:Increase2.svg  Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=File:Increase2.svg  License: Public Domain  Contributors: Sarang

LicenseCreative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported//creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/3.0/