"While competitors focused on squeezing more efficiency from their core business, Amazon gradually built additional engines with entirely different financial dynamics. Amazon Web Services, originally created to power internal operations, became a high-margin cloud giant that now generates a disproportionate share of the company's operating profit. That profitability gave Amazon something many large companies struggle to achieve: strategic freedom, the ability to invest aggressively, absorb failed experiments, and keep evolving."
"For years, the rivalry between Amazon and Walmart looked like a fight over retail: e-commerce versus stores, software versus logistics, disruption versus incumbency. But Amazon's rise to the top of the Fortune 500 points to a deeper leadership lesson, one that goes well beyond who sells the most goods. Amazon did not overtake Walmart by simply becoming a better retailer. It won by refusing to rely on retail economics alone."
Amazon appears poised to take the top spot on the Fortune 500, edging out Walmart after more than a decade. Amazon did not win by simply improving retail economics; it built distinct, high-margin businesses that transformed its financial profile. Amazon Web Services evolved from an internal tool into a cloud giant that generates a disproportionate share of operating profit and funds experimentation. Microsoft and Apple similarly used cloud and services to reshape software and extend hardware value, respectively. The decisive advantage comes from economic flexibility and adjacent profit engines that fund growth and absorb failed experiments, not scale alone.
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