Decade at Amazon
"I very frequently get the question, 'What's going to change in the next ten years?' And that is a very interesting question; it's a very common one. I almost never get the question, 'What's not going to change in the next ten years?' And I submit to you that that second question is actually the more important of the two."
— Jeff Bezos
Amazon · Blue Origin · Washington Post · Bezos Earth Fund · Bezos Academy
Last month, the Seattle Seahawks became World Champions — the Super Bowl LX parade rolled through downtown Seattle. That moment also quietly marked my 10th year as a Seattleite.
Today, March 14, 2026, is AWS's 20th birthday. It is also my 10-year anniversary at Amazon.
It is a genuine privilege to have been part of the second half of those 20 years — to build, to ship, and to grow alongside this company from the inside.
It is almost poetic — one of the few companies on Earth named after a river. I joined on March 14, 2016, when Jeff Bezos was still CEO, — the same calendar date as AWS's founding, March 14, 2006. Today marks 3,652 Day 1s.
Building Primitive Services
Over the past decade, whether by deliberate choice or simply where the work led me, I've had the opportunity to contribute to nearly every core primitive service across the stack.
Across these layers, I have helped launch 8 zero-to-one public products and contributed to countless efforts that scaled businesses by 10x or more. My work has been featured in 4 earnings reports and publicly recognized by CEOs. While work spans different products and services, the underlying theme has always been the same: customers.
In his 2023 Letter to Shareholders, CEO Andy Jassy explained the concept of "Primitive Services" — and it captures something I have believed in throughout my career:
"The best way we know how to do this is by building primitive services. Think of them as discrete, foundational building blocks that builders can weave together in whatever combination they desire. Here's how we described primitives in our 2003 AWS Vision document:
"Primitives are the raw parts or the most foundational-level building blocks for software developers. They're indivisible (if they can be functionally split into two they must) and they do one thing really well. They're meant to be used together rather than as solutions in and of themselves. And, we'll build them for maximum developer flexibility. We won't put a bunch of constraints on primitives to guard against developers hurting themselves. Rather, we'll optimize for developer freedom and innovation."
Of course, this concept of primitives can be applied to more than software development, but they're especially relevant in technology. And, over the last 20 years, primitives have been at the heart of how we've innovated quickly."
I believe deeply in fundamentals. Even in an AI-driven world, the principles that make basics great — simplicity, composability, reliability — do not expire.
A Note on the Industry
There have been thoughtful conversations lately about where technologists should plant their flag in the LLM era — including "The Cost of Staying" and Anthropic's economic research blog. I agree that research startups/labs are becoming a new center of gravity. At the same time, I still see substantial opportunities within big tech (FAANG) — to practice and innovate at scale. The clock is indeed ticking. Continuing to tackle hard problems and build new skill sets — that doesn't change.
What Does Not Change
- Are Right, A Lot. Keep doing hard and impactful work — that never changes.
- Stay humble and keep learning (保持谦逊，持续学习).
Deep gratitude to every leader and manager I've worked with along the way—can't make this milestone without your support.
Keep re:Inventing.
