Amazon operates AWS and began as an online bookstore in 1994.
Jeff Bezos founded Amazon in Bellevue, Washington, in July 1994, initially under the name Cadabra. The company opened its online bookstore in 1995 and later expanded into electronics, household goods, groceries, digital media, devices, logistics, and advertising.
Amazon Web Services grew from internal infrastructure work. Amazon began offering services such as storage and computing to outside developers in the mid-2000s, helping establish cloud computing as a large commercial market. AWS now provides infrastructure, databases, analytics, artificial intelligence, and many other services.
The company's retail site and AWS are often discussed together, but they are different businesses with different customers. Amazon's market value reflects the combined corporation, not only its e-commerce operation. Another common error is treating Amazon as an online bookstore; books were its starting point, not its present limit.