Jeff Bezos

Jeff Bezos (2018)

Jeffrey "Jeff" Bezos Preston [ beɪzoʊs ] (* 12. January 1964 in Albuquerque , New Mexico as Jeffrey Preston Jorgensen ) is an American entrepreneur and investor . He is the founder of the online mail order company Amazon and is currently (as of July 2020) the richest living individual in the world with an estimated total assets of approximately 152 billion US dollars.

Life

Bezos was born to Jacklyn Gise Jorgensen and Ted Jorgensen (1944-2015), and his parents divorced shortly after his birth. When Jeffrey was four years old, his mother Jackie married the Cuban exile Miguel "Mike" Bezos. The family moved to Houston , Texas , where Mike Bezos worked for the Exxon oil company. Jeffrey Bezos first attended the River Oaks Elementary School in Houston and, after the family moved to Miami, the Miami Palmetto Senior High School. From 1982 to 1986 he studied electrical engineering and computer science at Princeton University . Bezos received the academic degree Bachelor of Science (B. Sc.) With top marks in 1986 .

Bezos then worked first for the Taiwanese mobile phone company FITEL, then for the New York asset management companies Bankers Trust and DE Shaw & Co. There, together with David E. Shaw (* 1951), the idea of ​​an online book shop was born.

In 1994 he founded Amazon.com and separated from Shaw to develop the idea of online trading on his own.

In 2000 he founded the private space company Blue Origin . In August 2013, Jeff Bezos acquired The Washington Post for $ 250 million. These and other investments are managed by Bezos Expeditions .

Private

Jeff Bezos (2010)

Bezos was married to MacKenzie Bezos since 1993 and has four children: a daughter adopted from China and three sons. On January 9, 2019, the Bezos couple announced their intention to divorce. In February 2019, Bezos published an open letter to the publisher of the National Enquirer, David Pecker, in which he accused him of extortion . Bezos would have been threatened with publishing intimate private photos if he did not stop investigating how private text messages of himself and an extramarital affair got to the magazine. Bezos is in a relationship with presenter Lauren Sánchez . Bezos is a fan of Star Trek and - in an elaborate alien mask - made a cameo in the film Star Trek Beyond from 2016.

Projects

In 2007 he supported The Clock of the Long Now project with $ 42 million and in 2012 a campaign to open marriage to same-sex couples in Washington with $ 2.5 million.

In 2019 Bezos presented the lunar module "Blue Moon" from his company Blue Origin .

capital

Jeff Bezos is currently (July 2020) the richest person in the world. With an estimated net worth of approximately $ 152 billion, the Amazon boss is $ 16 billion richer than second-placed Bill Gates .

In early 2020, Bezos announced that he would donate $ 10 billion to fight climate change . Climate change is the "greatest threat to our planet". Starting in summer 2020, the money will go to the newly founded “ Bezos Earth Fund ”, which in turn will support scientists, climate activists and NGOs.

Controversy

In May 2014, Bezos was voted “Worst Boss in the World” at the World Congress of the International Trade Union Confederation . On August 15, 2015, the New York Times published an article entitled " Inside Amazon: Wrestling Big Ideas in a Bruising Workplace ". The newspaper criticized Amazon's business practices and the company's cultivated management style in the article. Bezos, in turn, commented on the article and stated that he did not recognize his company in the description of the newspaper.

Awards

• In 1999 Time magazine voted him Person of the Year .
• In 2012 he was named Fortune Businessman of the Year.
• In 2012, Bezos was elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences .
• In 2017 Bezos was inducted into the Logistics Hall of Fame .
• In 2018 he was elected to the National Academy of Engineering .
• In 2018, Bezos received the Axel Springer Award .

literature

• Richard L. Brandt: one click. The rise of amazon and Jeff Bezos. Redline, Munich 2013, ISBN 978-3-86881-487-3 .
• Brad Stone : The seller of everything. Jeff Bezos and the Empire of Amazon. Translated from the English by Bernhard Schmid. 2nd, expanded new edition. Campus, Frankfurt am Main 2019, ISBN 978-3-593-51062-0 .
• Jeff Bezos in the Munzinger archive ( beginning of article freely accessible)

Web links

Commons : Jeff Bezos  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

• Dossier on Jeff Bezos from Spiegel Online
• Walter Niederberger: The control freak portrait in: Tages-Anzeiger from September 5, 2013
• Bezos expeditions

Individual evidence

1. ^ Jeff Bezos pronounces his name . 2009. Retrieved August 17, 2013.
2. ↑ Ted J Jorgensen Theodore John “Ted” Jorgensen, Jr , findagrave.com , accessed October 11, 2019
3. ↑ Sara Nathan: The sad story behind Jeff Bezos and his biological father , pagesix.com, January 10, 2019
4. ↑ Gerhard Hegmann: Jeff Bezos is investing in the New Space with his company Blue Origin . May 3, 2018 ( welt.de [accessed February 19, 2019]).
5. ^ Washington Post to be sold to Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon , in: The Washington Post , accessed August 5, 2013.
6. ↑ Overview of Bezos Expeditions. In: crunchbase.com. Archived from the original on July 30, 2017 ; accessed on February 11, 2019 . 
7. ^ DEI Creative in Seattle, WA: Bezos Expeditions. In: www.bezosexpeditions.com. Retrieved December 2, 2016 . 
8. ↑ Separation after 25 years: The wife of the richest man in the world gets this much money , focus.de from January 9, 2019
9. ↑ Jeff Bezos Fast Facts ( English ) CNN. July 20, 2016. Retrieved July 25, 2016.
10. ↑ Sara Salinas: Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos and wife MacKenzie are divorcing. January 9, 2019, accessed January 9, 2019 . 
11. ↑ Jeff Bezos: No thank you, Mr. Pecker. In: Jeff Bezos. February 7, 2019, accessed February 19, 2019 . 
12. ↑ ^{a b} Medial mud battle: Jeff Bezos accuses scandal sheet of extortion . ISSN  0174-4909 ( faz.net [accessed February 19, 2019]).
13. ↑ Amazon boss is blackmailed with nude photos - and that also has to do with Donald Trump. February 8, 2019, accessed February 19, 2019 . 
14. ↑ Affair of the Amazon boss with the presenter: magazine reportedly paid $ 200,000 for Bezos' SMS , Der Spiegel , March 19, 2019
15. ^ Alan Boyle: Get a look at Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos as an alien in 'Star Trek Beyond' ( English ) In: GeekWire . July 20, 2016. Retrieved July 25, 2016.
16. ↑ Amazon founder donates for gay marriage
17. ^ ZEIT ONLINE: Space travel: Jeff Bezos presents the lunar module "Blue Moon" . In: The time . May 10, 2019, ISSN  0044-2070 ( zeit.de [accessed on May 13, 2019]).
18. ↑ Blue Moon. Retrieved May 13, 2019 . 
19. ↑ https://www.bild.de/geld/wirtschaft/wirtschaft/corona-getrotzt-mega-scheid-verkraftet-jeff-bezos-vermoegen-erreich-neuen-re-71641532.bild.html
20. ↑ Fight against climate change. Amazon boss wants to donate ten billion dollars . In: t-online.de , February 17, 2020. Retrieved February 18, 2020.
21. ↑ Süddeutsche Zeitung: Jeff Bezos, worst boss in the world from May 22, 2014, accessed on May 23, 2014
22. ↑ New York Times criticizes Amazon's working conditions: "I would leave such a company" - manager magazin. Retrieved August 14, 2016 . 
23. ↑ Full memo: Jeff Bezos responds to brutal NYT story, says it doesn't represent the Amazon he leads. August 17, 2015. Retrieved August 14, 2016 (American English). 
24. ↑ http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,992927,00.html
25. ↑ http://fortune.com/2012/11/16/amazons-jeff-bezos-the-ultimate-disrupter/
26. ↑ Florian Schmidt: Amazon boss Jeff Bezos received the Axel Springer Award. In: BZ-Berlin.de. April 25, 2018. Retrieved April 25, 2018 .