Amazon CEO Andy Jassy doesn’t believe the retail and cloud computing giant should be counted out of the artificial intelligence race just yet.
In a wide-ranging interview with CNBC, Jassy challenged the notion that Amazon has fallen behind in AI as Microsoft and Google add chatbots to consumer products like their search engines, likening it to the “hype cycle” before the “substance cycle.”
“I think most people are focused on the applications, you know, things like ChatGPT brought everybody’s awareness up, but I think of generative AI as having three macro layers,” Jassy told Jon Fortt in an interview that aired on “Closing Bell Overtime” late Thursday. “I think they’re all really big and important.”
Jassy has said Amazon intends to invest in AI across the company, and that AI programs have the potential to improve “virtually every customer experience.” But he specifically pointed to Amazon Web Services as one business that can capitalize on the buzz around AI over the long term.
Earlier this year, AWS unveiled a generative AI service called Bedrock, where clients can use language models from Amazon and other startups to develop their own chatbots and image-generation services.
AWS has also developed its own AI-specific chips, called Inferentia and Trainium, which aim to make it easier for developers to run large AI language models in the cloud. It’s going up against Nvidia, whose powerful semiconductors have dominated the market for AI chips.
Amazon expects its chips to have “much better price-performance than you’ll find anywhere else,” Jassy said.
Through Bedrock, Amazon’s custom chips, and other services like CodeWhisperer, which generates and suggests code for developers, Jassy said Amazon stands to have a real edge in AI.
AI has shaped up to be a rare area for investment inside Amazon as Jassy has culled some of the company’s riskier bets and looked to cut costs due to slowing sales and a gloomy economic outlook. Amazon recently underwent the largest layoffs in its history, cutting 27,000 employees. It has also paused expansion of its Fresh supermarket and Go convenience store chains, while ending a virtual tours service, a video calling device for kids and its Care telehealth service.
Super Micro Computer CEO Charles Liang at the Computex conference in Taipei, Taiwan, on June 5, 2024.
Annabelle Chih | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Super Micro Computer gave optimistic commentary for its fiscal 2026 and delayed annual report that overshadowed its slashed fiscal 2025 revenue guidance in Tuesday’s preliminary second-quarter results.
CEO Charles Liang said he is “confident” that the company will file its delayed annual report by the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission’s Feb. 25 deadline. The company also said it expects to hit $40 billion in revenue in fiscal 2026. Analysts polled by LSEG expected $30 billion in revenue for the period.
Shares of Super Micro were up as much as 10% in extended trading.
For the near term, however, the company slashed its guidance for fiscal 2025 revenue. The company said it expects revenues to range between $23.5 billion to $25 billion for fiscal 2025. That was down from a previous forecast of $26 billion and $30 billion. Analysts polled by LSEG expected revenues of $24.9 billion for the year.
The company also said it expects to report net sales between $5.6 billion and $5.7 billion for the quarter that ended Dec. 31. Wall Street expected $5.89 billion, according to analysts polled by LSEG. The company also offered weaker-than-expected guidance for the current period.
Super Micro also said that it “continues to work diligently” to meet the deadline to file its delayed fiscal 2024 annual and fiscal 2025 first and second quarter reports as it faces the possibility of a Nasdaq delisting.
Shares of the company, known for its servers powered with Nvidia graphics processing chips, have been on a rollercoaster ride since Hindenburg Research revealed a short position in the stock and the company delayed releasing its annual report in August. The company’s auditor quit in October, citing governance issues, and Super Micro’s drop in share price spurred the possibility of a delisting from the Nasdaq exchange.
Super Micro’s prime position in the artificial intelligence world catapulted the stock to new heights as ChatGPT’s 2022 debut set off a craze for AI infrastructure. Recent earnings reports and commentary suggest that megacaps Meta, Amazon, Alphabet and Microsoft plan to invest as much as $320 billion into AI projects this year.
Tesla and SpaceX CEO Elon Musk joins U.S. President Donald Trump during an executive order signing in the Oval Office at the White House on Feb. 11, 2025 in Washington, DC.
Andrew Harnik | Getty Images
Tesla shares dropped 6% on Tuesday after Chinese rival BYD announced plans to develop autonomous vehicle technology with DeepSeek, and said it would offer its Autopilot-like system in nearly all of its new cars, adding to fears that Elon Musk’s company is falling behind the competition.
There’s also growing concerns surrounding Musk’s distractions outside of Tesla, after news surfaced that the world’s richest person is offering to lead an investor group in purchasing OpenAI, while he steps up his work with President Donald Trump’s White House.
Tesla’s stock price has slid for five straight days, falling close to 17% over that stretch to $328.50, and wiping out over $200 billion in market cap.
BYD, which has emerged as Tesla’s fiercest rival on the world stage, said on Monday that at least 21 of its new model vehicles will come equipped with its partially automated driving systems that include features for automatic parking and navigating on highways.
Tesla doesn’t yet offer a robotaxi and its EVs currently require a human driver to remain at the wheel, ready to steer or brake at any time. On Tesla’s earnings call last month, Musk said the company is aiming to launch “Unsupervised Full Self-Driving,” and a driverless rideshare service in Austin, Texas, in June. Alphabet’s Waymo already operates a robotaxi service in Austin as well as in parts of Phoenix, San Francisco.
“In our view, competition between Waymo, Tesla and a host of Chinese players is a key driver on the path to commercialization” of robotaxis,” Morgan Stanley analysts wrote in a note to clients after the BYD announcement. The firm recommends buying the stock and has a price target of $430.
Waymo said on Tuesday that it added 10 square miles of coverage to its robotaxi service in Los Angeles.
In a report on Tuesday, Oppenheimer analysts wrote that the “autonomy competition may limit [Tesla] profitability.” Even if Tesla meets its June 2025 timeline for driverless cars in Texas, the company is “one of several autonomous technology providers, suggesting competition on price and performance,” they wrote.
In addition to running Tesla, Musk is CEO of SpaceX, owns social media company X and is head of artificial intelligence startup xAI. He’s also spending significant time these days in Washington, D.C., running the “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE) as a special government employee, aiming to slash federal spending, personnel, regulations and even entire agencies.
Many projects, many distractions
Investors already concerned about Musk’s hefty commitments beyond his trillion-dollar EV company have more reason for trepidation after events that unfolded on Monday. Musk’s attorney, Marc Toberoff, confirmed to CNBC that Musk was leading a consortium of investors in a $97.4 billion bid for OpenAI.
Musk was among the founders of OpenAI in 2015, when the AI startup was created as a nonprofit research lab. Musk sought to have Tesla acquire OpenAI, and he later departed the organization’s board.
OpenAI has since commercialized numerous products, most notably ChatGPT. Co-founder and CEO Sam Altman is seeking to restructure OpenAI as a for-profit entity. Musk has sued OpenAI to prevent that transition, and started xAI as a direct competitor.
The Oppenheimer analysts wrote that, “While [Tesla] has shifted focus to being a Physical AI play, we view Elon Musk’s bid for Open AI as a distraction from [Tesla’s] challenges.”
Altman told employees in a memo on Tuesday that OpenAI’s board hasn’t received an official offer from Musk and reminded staffers that “Elon has a history of making claims that don’t hold up.”
Later on Tuesday, Toberoff said in a statement that he emailed the bid for OpenAI on behalf of the Musk-led consortium a day earlier to OpenAI’s outside counsel William Savitt and Sarah Eddy “for transmission to their client.” Toberoff said the bid was “in the form of a detailed four-page letter” and was addressed to OpenAI’s board.
“Whether Sam Altman chose to provide or withhold this from OpenAI’s other Board members is outside of our control,” he wrote.
Oppenheimer’s analysts also highlighted the added risks associated with Musk’s extensive work with the Trump administration.
While Musk’s behavior “has fans in certain circles,” his public life “risks alienating consumers and employees as the Trump administration tests the limits of its power,” they wrote. For example, they referenced recent vehicle registration data that showed steep year-over-year declines in California and across several European markets.
Tesla and Musk didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment.
Amazon is opening a beauty and health products store in Milan, Italy, marking the company’s latest brick-and-mortar experiment.
The store is located in the city center of Milan, and features a range of beauty and personal care items, as well as nonprescription drugs, Amazon said in a blog post. The first store, which is called Amazon Parafarmacia & Beauty, will open its doors to the public on Wednesday.
The store will be stocked with products from beauty and skin-care brands including La Roche-Posay, Eucerin and Vichy. There are also “Derma-bars,” where shoppers can get a “complimentary digital skin analysis” of their skin type and condition, and receive product recommendations.
Amazon says the store includes a section staffed by on-site pharmacists where shoppers can purchase “non-prescription, over-the-counter medications.”
By launching its first “parapharmacy,” the e-commerce giant is hoping to parlay its online success in the beauty and personal care category into sales in the physical world. Beauty and personal care items, which include everything from hairspray and cosmetics to deodorants and Q-tips, make up one of the fastest-growing verticals on Amazon.
The company began offering health and beauty products in 2000, but its selection was initially limited to most mass-market brands. It has since added more luxury brands such as Estée Lauder and La Mer.
The new store format also marks Amazon’s latest experiment in physical retail. The company opened and then shutteredall of its bookstores, pop-up shops, four-star stores and apparel stores. It has also shrunk its footprint of Amazon Go convenience stores, shutting down a storefront in Woodland Hills, California, last month. In grocery, Amazon’s portfolio includes Whole Foods supermarkets and its own chain of Fresh stores.