Adventures in cloud continue to deliver profits for Amazon

29 Jul 2016

Seizing opportunities in business and cloud, e-commerce giant Amazon is on something of a profitable spree

E-commerce and cloud giant Amazon has reported its third quarterly profit in a row with revenues of $30.4bn driven by opportunities in the cloud arena.

Revenues at Amazon in its Q2 results were up 31pc to $30.4bn from $23.2bn this time last year. This yielded Amazon a profit of $857m in its latest quarter, compared with $92m a year ago.

During the quarter, Amazon launched Prime in India and introduced a $79 Kindle device, while Amazon Studios received 16 Emmy nominations.

Amazon is all business

The company revealed that Amazon Business now serves more than 400,000 firms and generated more than $1bn in sales in its first year.

Amazon Web Services (AWS), the company’s on-demand cloud division, generated $2.8bn in revenues, up 58pc on last year.

Looking ahead to the third quarter, Amazon is predicting revenues of between $31bn and $33.5bn.

“It’s been a busy few months for Amazon around the world and particularly in India where we launched a new AWS region, introduced Prime with unlimited free shipping, and announced that Prime Video is coming soon, offering Prime members in India exclusive access to Amazon original series and movies including original content featuring top Indian creators and talent,” said Jeff Bezos, founder and CEO of Amazon.

“The team in India is inventing at a torrid pace, and we’re very grateful to our Indian customers for their welcoming response.”

Amazon river image via Shutterstock

John Kennedy is a journalist who served as editor of Silicon Republic for 17 years

editorial@siliconrepublic.com