Amazon (NASDAQ: AMZN) has claimed the No. 1 spot on the Fortune 500 list, surpassing $700 billion in revenue following a 12% jump in 2025 sales.
The milestone ends Walmart’s (NYSE: WMT) historic 13-year run at the top of the list, with the retail giant falling to No. 2 for the first time since 2012.
Amazon’s SVP and CFO Brian Olsavsky has led the company’s finance operations for over a decade, witnessing its rise from the inside throughout its most transformative years.
Amazon first appeared on the Fortune 500 in 2002 at No. 492, the same year Olsavsky joined the company, when it was a fraction of Walmart’s size.
The company’s growth has been driven by a multi-engine business model spanning e-commerce, logistics, AWS, and a fast-growing advertising business, reshaping what a retailer looks like in the age of cloud computing and AI.
Olsavsky became finance chief in June 2015, having previously served as VP of finance and CFO for the global consumer business, as well as VP of finance for Amazon’s North America retail business unit and acquisitions.
He spent much of his tenure under CEO Jeff Bezos, who founded the company in 1994 and stepped down in 2021, when Andy Jassy took over as chief executive.
Amazon navigated several major challenges over the past two decades, including the 2008 financial crisis, a roughly 50% stock decline in 2022 amid inflation and a post-pandemic pullback, and an AWS slowdown in 2022 through 2023.
Scott Simmons, co-managing partner at executive search firm Crist Kolder Associates, highlighted the significance of Olsavsky’s longevity in the role given the demands of the position.
“Olsavsky stands in a class of his own, in part given that Amazon has grown and evolved at warp speed,” Simmons said, adding that “his remarkable 11-plus year run as CFO at Amazon shatters the average tenure for public company CFOs, which sits at just under five years.”
Simmons noted that Olsavsky built credibility over his first 13 years at Amazon before stepping into the CFO role, and suggested his tenure could continue well into the future.
“Though roughly half of new CEOs change out their CFOs in the first 12 months, I can see Olsavsky, who is only 61, staying on for as long as he wants,” Simmons said.
Amazon’s momentum has carried strongly into 2026, with the company posting $181.5 billion in Q1 revenue alone, representing a 15% increase year-over-year.
AWS revenue grew 28% in the quarter, the fastest the company has recorded in nearly four years, while its custom chips business surpassed a $20 billion annual revenue run rate.
Olsavsky pointed to the company’s artificial intelligence expansion as a key growth driver, stating on the April 29 earnings call: “Our AI revenue is growing triple digits year-over-year.”
