The Amazon.com Inc. (NASDAQ: AMZN) headcount at the end of last year was just above 800,000. At its current growth rate, it would become one of the few American companies with a million employees by the end of 2020. That is a sign of how large Amazon has become and its effect on the economy. Founder and CEO Jeff Bezos is considered one of the most influential people in 2020 as well.
In a further sign of 2020 growth, Amazon has disclosed it will add 15,000 to its campus in Bellevue Washington, relatively near its global headquarters, although not all those jobs will be added this year. It has inked a deal for 335,000 square feet in New York’s growing Hudson Yards neighborhood too.
Across the United States, Amazon’s warehouses are booming. Same-day delivery needs are part of this. Its North American sales grew from $44.1 billion in the final quarter of 2018 to $53.7 billion in the last quarter of 2019. That is a growth rate of 22.7%. In addition, Amazon Web Services (AWS), the leading cloud service in the world, posted fourth-quarter revenue of $7.3 billion, which grew to $10.0 billion in the final quarter of last year.
Among the world’s private and public companies, Amazon is probably the third largest behind Walmart at 2.2 million and China National Petroleum at 1.4 million, based on 2019 numbers. It is probably eighth or ninth in terms of revenue worldwide. At its rate of growth, it could rise to the sixth or seventh place this year.
Amazon likely will continue to grow at a rate of 20% for another year or two, and then well into the double digits after that. E-commerce has done much to cripple brick-and-mortar retail, which has lost over 100,000 jobs in the last year. And cloud companies continue to add workers as firms turn to services that store and manipulate tech work remotely.
In fact, given the work Amazon is in, it could pass a million employees before the end of the year.
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