Jassy, Bezos, and Dalzell presented the plan for the new AWS to the Amazon board, and the institutional no came close to rearing its ugly head. John Doerr, expressing what he would later call a “healthy skepticism,” asked the obvious question: At a time when Amazon was having difficulty hiring engineers and needed to accelerate its international expansion, “Why would we go into this business?” “Because we need it as well,” Bezos replied, suggesting that Amazon’s demand for such a service reflected the broader market need. Jassy remembers Doerr telling him after the meeting that he was lucky to
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