On Tuesday, February 2nd, Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos announced that he will be stepping down from his CEO position and will take on the role of executive chairman. Stepping in as the new Amazon CEO will be Andrew Jassy, the current CEO of Amazon Web Services and a long-time friend of Bezos. Jassy is set to replace Bezos as CEO sometime in the third quarter of 2021.

Jeff Bezos founded the online mega-mall Amazon in 1994, expanding the company from a small online bookstore to a globally regarded company with more than $126 billion in sales during the fourth quarter of 2020 alone. Bezos contributed heavily to Amazon’s current stance as one of the world’s most successful and valuable companies; in September 2020 the multinational corporation was said to have been worth almost $1.8 trillion.

However, Bezos stepping down as Amazon CEO later this year does not mean that he is leaving the company for good. Bezos will be taking on a new role as executive chairman where he will still participate in big-picture decisions like product development. Bezos’ stepping down as CEO also frees him up to focus on his multiple other interests such as The Washington Post, which he purchased in 2013 for $250 million.

Jeff Bezos has long been known as the famed CEO of a multinational corporation that has skyrocketed in terms of overall success. His stepping down, however, is not unique in the sense that most of the revolutionary “big five” technology companies — Amazon, Facebook, Microsoft, Apple and Google — have also undergone leadership changes. Bill Gates was the CEO of Microsoft for nearly as long as Bezos has led Amazon, but he stepped down as CEO in January 2000. Jeff Bezos’ transition from CEO of a globally regarded company to executive chairman is common among large companies as it keeps a company’s key visionary involved in large decisions.