Amazon Web Services generates 45 percent higher revenue in fourth quarter

For the most recent quarter, Amazon Web Services gave Amazon $5.11 billion in revenue, representing 44.6% growth rate. According to the company’s latest financial results, it has generated revenue of $60.5bn across the company, which is more than what analyst had expected in the fourth quarter, with particular focus on Alexa. Jeff Bezos, CEO of Amazon, said, “We don’t see positive surprises of this magnitude very often – expect us to double down.”

Looking at the financial results, it can be said that Amazon Web Services has become very profitable for its parent company leaving behind Google, IBM, Alibaba and Oracle. According to Brian Olsavsky, Amazon chief financial officer, AWS now has a revenue run rate of over $20 billion. Operating income at Amazon Web Services rose to $1.35 billion for the quarter, topping the estimate of $1.27 billion.

Along with building up its revenue capability, AWS has also been gradually delivering more and more operating income to Amazon, which provides funding for additional ventures and investments, especially outside North America. In the fourth quarter, AWS operating income equated to more than 60 percent of the operating income for the entirety of Amazon. AWS also launched services for translation and transcription, introduced a camera for developers that can perform artificial intelligence computations and announced data centers just for U.S. intelligence agencies. In November, AWS CEO, Andy Jassy mentioned that the public cloud now offers customers more than a hundred services.