Earnings Call Transcript - AMZN Q1 2023

Operator, Operator

Good day, everyone, and welcome to the Amazon.com First Quarter 2023 Financial Results Teleconference. At this time, all participants are in a listen-only mode. After the presentation, we will conduct a question-and-answer session. Today’s call is being recorded. For opening remarks, I will be turning the call over to the Vice President of Investor Relations, Dave Fildes. Thank you, sir. Please go ahead.

Dave Fildes, Vice President of Investor Relations

Hello, and welcome to our Q1 2023 financial results conference call. Joining us today to answer your questions is Andy Jassy, our CEO; and Brian Olsavsky, our CFO. As you listen to today’s conference call, we encourage you to have our press release in front of you, which includes our financial results as well as metrics and commentary on the quarter. Please note, unless otherwise stated, all comparisons in this call will be against our results for the comparable period of 2022. Our comments and responses to your questions reflect management’s views as of today, April 27, 2023, only and will include forward-looking statements. Actual results may differ materially. Additional information about factors that could potentially impact our financial results is included in today’s press release and our filings with the SEC, including our most recent annual report on Form 10-K and subsequent filings. During this call, we may discuss certain non-GAAP financial measures. In our press release, slides accompanying this webcast and our filings with the SEC, each of which is posted on our IR website, you will find additional disclosures regarding these non-GAAP measures, including reconciliations of these measures with comparable GAAP measures. Our guidance incorporates the order trends that we’ve seen to date and what we believe today to be appropriate assumptions. Our results are inherently unpredictable and may be materially affected by many factors, including fluctuations in foreign exchange rates, changes in global economic and geopolitical conditions and customer demand and spending, including the impact of recessionary fears, inflation, interest rates, regional labor market constraints, world events, the rate of growth of the internet, online commerce and cloud services and the various factors detailed in our filings with the SEC. Our guidance assumes, among other things, that we don’t conclude any additional business acquisitions, restructurings or legal settlements. It’s not possible to accurately predict demand for our goods and services, and therefore, our actual results could differ materially from our guidance. And now, I’ll turn the call over to Brian.

Brian Olsavsky, CFO

Thank you for joining today’s call. As Dave mentioned earlier, I’m joined today by Andy Jassy, our CEO. Before we move on to take your questions, I’ll make some comments regarding our Q1 results. Let’s begin with revenue. For the first quarter, our worldwide net sales were $127.4 billion, up 9% year-over-year, or 11% excluding approximately 210 basis points of unfavorable impact from changes in foreign exchange rates. This was above the top end of our guidance range. Overall, we are pleased with the growth that we’re seeing in our worldwide store businesses, including quarter-over-quarter revenue acceleration in the International segment, which is helped by easing macroeconomic pressures in Europe. Across the geographies we serve, customers appreciate our focus on staying sharp on pricing, having strong selection and easier convenience, including delivery speeds, which continued to improve throughout the first quarter. That said, the uncertain economic environment and ongoing inflationary pressures continue to be a factor, and we believe it’s continuing to drive cautious spending across consumers. This means our customers are looking to stretch their budgets further and are focused on value. We saw moderated spending on discretionary categories as well as shifts to lower-priced items and healthy demand in everyday essentials, such as consumables and beauty. Third-party sellers, including businesses who elect to utilize Fulfillment by Amazon for their storage and shipping services are a key contributor to the selection offered to customers. We also continued to invest meaningfully in brand protection efforts, including industry-leading technology, so that sellers can trust we will provide a great selling experience free from bad actors. Sellers comprised 59% of overall unit sales in Q1, up from 55% one year ago. We also saw strong engagement in our advertising services with revenue up 23% year-over-year, excluding the impact from changes in foreign exchange rates. In particular, our sponsored product and brand offerings remain a key driver of growth as we work with advertisers to help customers make more informed purchase decisions. Our teams remain focused on delivering performance through our comprehensive and flexible measurement capabilities along with insights that allow advertisers the ability to measure the return on their advertising spend and help them grow their business. In AWS, net sales were $21.4 billion in the first quarter, up 16% year-over-year and representing an annualized sales run rate of more than $85 billion. Given the ongoing economic uncertainty, customers of all sizes in all industries continue to look for cost savings across their businesses, similar to what you’ve seen us doing at Amazon. As expected, customers continue to evaluate ways to optimize their cloud spending in response to these tough economic conditions in the first quarter. And we are seeing these optimizations continue into the second quarter with April revenue growth rates about 500 basis points lower than what we saw in Q1. As a reminder, we’re not trying to optimize for any one quarter or year. We’re working to build customer relationships and a business that will outlast all of us. Therefore, our AWS sales and support teams continue to spend much of their time helping customers optimize their AWS spend so that they can better weather this uncertain economy. This customer orientation is built into our DNA and how we think about our customer relationships and business over the long term. Now, let’s shift to worldwide operating income. For the first quarter, we reported $4.8 billion in operating income, above the top end of our guidance range. This operating income was negatively impacted by an estimated employee severance charge of approximately $470 million in Q1, including $270 million related to AWS. As we finalized our annual planning process and considered the ongoing economic environment, we made the difficult decision to eliminate 9,000 roles, impacting our AWS business as well as Twitch, devices, advertising and our human resources teams. In Q1, our year-over-year growth in store revenue and unit sales outpaced growth in both our fulfillment expense and our outbound shipping costs. Inflationary pressures continued to ease quarter-over-quarter, primarily driven by reductions in linehaul shipping rates as well as lower diesel fuel and electricity costs. We also built on the progress we made throughout 2022 in improving productivity in our fulfillment network through continued process and tech improvements. We exited Q4 with a good balance of labor throughout the network and leveraged that throughout Q1 with customer demand patterns remaining more stable compared to Q1 of last year. As labor availability has stabilized and inventory supply chain challenges have moderated, we’re able to implement some significant structural changes to transition our U.S. fulfillment network to a regionalized model. We believe these improvements put us in a good position to improve both delivery speed and our cost to serve customers over time. We reported overall net income of $3.2 billion in the first quarter. While we primarily focus our comments on operating income, I’d point out that this net income includes a pretax valuation loss of $467 million included in non-operating expense from our common stock investment in Rivian Automotive. As we’ve noted in recent quarters, this activity is not related to Amazon’s ongoing operations but rather to quarter-to-quarter fluctuations in Rivian’s stock price. Turning to cash flows. We remain focused on building long-term sustainable growth in free cash flow, including our efforts towards a strong cash flow accretive working capital cycle. Our operating cash flow for the trailing 12 months ended March 31st increased to $54.3 billion, up 38% versus the comparable period year-over-year. Besides the cash benefit of improved profitability year-over-year, we’ve also seen supply chains easing up and made progress to improve our inventory purchasing and payment cycles, which in turn has a positive impact on working capital. Now, let’s turn to our capital investments. We define our capital investments as the combination of CapEx plus equipment finance leases. For the full year 2023, we expect capital investments to be lower than our $59 billion investment level in 2022, primarily driven by an expected year-over-year decrease in fulfillment network investments. We’re continuing to invest in infrastructure to support AWS customer needs, including investments to support Large Language Models and generative AI. Before we open the call up for your questions, I’ll hand it over to Andy to share some high-level perspectives on the first quarter.

Andy Jassy, CEO

Thanks, Brian. I’ll share a few thoughts before opening up for questions. From my perspective, I think there’s a fair bit to like about how our teams are delivering for customers and the results we’re starting to see. In our storage business, we’ve been very focused on reducing our cost to serve in our fulfillment network. As we shared in the past, given the unexpected surge in demand during the pandemic, we doubled the size of our fulfillment center footprint and largely built the transportation network the size of UPS in a couple of years. This ended up substantially changing the number of nodes and connections in our fulfillment network. And as a result, we spent the last several months not only redesigning dozens of processes to drive better productivity but also re-architecting our placement approach and larger fulfillment center footprint to move from a national fulfillment network in the U.S. to a regional one. It means we’ve created eight interconnected regions in geographic areas with each of these regions having broad relevant selection to operate in a largely self-sufficient way while still being able to ship nationally when necessary. We just recently completed this rollout and are quite bullish on the early results. Not surprisingly, shorter travel distances mean lower cost to serve and customers getting their orders faster. And while on the topic of delivery speed, we’re really excited about our progress in providing customers more one-day and same-day deliveries and are on track to have our fastest Prime delivery speeds ever in 2023. On the advertising side, we’re continuing to buck wider advertising trends and deliver robust growth. I think there are a few reasons for it. First, even in difficult economies, most people still shop. And with the largest e-commerce shopping venue, we have a lot of customers that companies seek to reach. That, coupled with our very substantial investment in machine learning to make sure customers see relevant ads when they’re looking for various items, have meant that these advertisements have performed unusually well for brands, which makes them want to advertise on Amazon. It’s also worth noting that we’re still very early in our efforts to find a way to thoughtfully place ads in our broader video, live sports, audio and grocery properties. We have a lot of upside still in advertising. In AWS, what we’re seeing is enterprises continuing to be cautious in their spending in this uncertain time. Customers are looking for ways to save money however they can right now. They tell us that most of it is cost optimizing versus cost cutting, which is an interesting distinction because they say they’re cost optimizing to reallocate those resources on new customer experiences. One of the great attributes of the cloud is that you can scale seamlessly up or down as demand dictates, which is not the case with on-premises infrastructure. Customers want help finding ways to spend less during this challenging time. And given that it’s best for customers long term, we’ve been actively helping customers make these adjustments. We’ve spent a fair bit of time analyzing what we’re seeing, and I’ve spent a good chunk of time myself looking as well, and we like the fundamentals of what we’re seeing in AWS. The new customer pipeline looks strong. The set of ongoing migrations of workloads to AWS is strong. The product innovation and delivery is rapid and compelling. And people sometimes forget that over 90% of global IT spend is still on-premises. If you believe that equation is going to flip, which we do, it’s going to move to the cloud. And having the cloud infrastructure offering with the broadest functionality by a fair bit, the best security, operational performance and the largest partner ecosystem bodes well for us moving forward. But we’re not close to being done inventing in AWS. Our recent announcement on Large Language Models and generative AI and the chips and managed services associated with them is another recent example. And in my opinion, few folks appreciate how much new cloud business will happen over the next several years from the pending deluge of machine learning that’s coming. This past year has seen us do a fair bit of cost streamlining. As I mentioned in my recent shareholder letter, we took a deep look across the Company and asked ourselves whether we had conviction about each initiative’s long-term potential to drive enough revenue, operating income, free cash flow and return on invested capital. In some cases, it led us to shutter certain businesses like our physical bookstores, Amazon Fabric, Amazon Care and certain devices where we didn’t see a path to meaningful returns. In other cases, we looked at some programs that weren’t producing the returns we’d hoped, an example of free shipping for all online grocery orders over $35 and changed them. We also made the very difficult decision to eliminate about 27,000 corporate roles. Like most leadership teams, we will continue to evaluate what we’re seeing in our business and proceed adaptively. But while we’ve taken several actions to streamline our costs, we’ve been able to do so while still pursuing the key strategic long-term investments that we believe can meaningfully make customers’ lives better and potentially change what Amazon is. These are investments both in our larger business as mentioned earlier as well as in areas like international expansion in our stores business, large retail market segments in which we’re still nascent like grocery and business-to-business, allowing consumers to use Prime off of Amazon in our Buy with Prime program, entertainment, devices, health care and our Low Earth Orbit satellite for the hundreds of millions of households, companies and government entities that have limited to no connectivity. It’s hard to predict that all of these will be successful but only one or two working would change our business over the long term. We have a lot of work in front of us, but I like the direction we’re headed and strongly believe our best days are in front of us. And with that, I’ll open it up for questions.

Operator, Operator

Our first question comes from Doug Anmuth at JPMorgan.

Doug Anmuth, Analyst

Andy, you talked about the continued optimization. Just curious, can you talk about the degree to which optimization has been done in AWS versus what you think could still lie ahead, and when do you start to lap some of those efforts? And then also on the CapEx side, I think you said overall CapEx would be down in ‘23. Can you just help us understand that a little bit better between retail and AWS? And then what’s required on CapEx from a generative AI and large language model perspective? Thanks.

Brian Olsavsky, CFO

This is Brian. I'll address the second part of that question first. Last year, we spent $59 billion on CapEx. In our core fulfillment and transportation areas, we are actually spending less than the previous year, and those estimates are decreasing. We are increasing our investments in AWS and infrastructure, allocating more funds for Large Language Models and generative AI. As a result, we're creating some room in our fulfillment and transportation budget that has been redirected to AWS. We still anticipate that overall CapEx will be lower compared to last year.

Andy Jassy, CEO

Regarding your first question, Doug, it's difficult to pinpoint our exact position in the process. What we consistently observe in our conversations with customers is their cautious approach to the current economic landscape. Like many companies, including ours, they're seeking ways to conserve costs. We have a longstanding commitment to pursue strategies that benefit both our customers and our business in the long run, rather than focusing solely on short-term outcomes. Our goal is to support customers in achieving lasting success because we want to foster relationships that endure. We are dedicating significant effort to assist customers in identifying smart, long-term cost optimization strategies, as opposed to merely short-term tactics. One of the cloud’s key advantages is its scalability—rapid growth allows for seamless expansion, and during periods of decreased demand, customers can reduce their usage and stop incurring costs, which is not the case with on-premises solutions. We are actively working to facilitate this process for our customers. It's crucial to understand that customers are clearly telling us this is not about reducing their overall technology or cloud spending. Instead, it's about reprioritizing what is most critical to their business at this time and reallocating resources to enhance customer experiences and innovate in ways that weren’t previously possible. These projects take time; when reallocating and redefining priorities, it requires actual development before implementation can occur. We are collaborating closely with customers on these initiatives. Moreover, there is significant growth potential in the cloud market—over 90% of global IT expenditures are still on-premises. If you believe that this dynamic will shift toward cloud adoption, you're on the right track. Additionally, many may not yet be aware of the upcoming wave of cloud spending driven by Large Language Models and generative AI. Countless customer experiences are set to be reimagined or created from scratch, and I believe that most of this spending will occur in the cloud.

Operator, Operator

And our next question comes from the line of Eric Sheridan with Goldman Sachs.

Eric Sheridan, Analyst

Andy, you've mentioned in your letter and on the last earnings call about increasing efficiencies in the Company and possibly returning to the margin structures we had before the pandemic, as well as managing the overcapacity that occurred during that time. Can you provide an update on how you see progress in achieving margins similar to pre-pandemic levels and balancing profitability with your growth initiatives over the next couple of years? Thank you.

Brian Olsavsky, CFO

Eric, this is Brian. Let me start on the financial part of that question. So I think we would describe ourselves as like along on the journey and making solid progress on recovering our cost structure and getting it back to pre-pandemic levels. Andy’s talked about the efforts in operations and the regionalization of our operations. We’ve obviously taken a hard look at all of our businesses that we’re in over the last 6 to 9 months and have made adjustments there. But there’s still a lot ahead of us, especially on the operational side that if you look at our operating margin in North America, for example North America segment, it was 1.2% this quarter, pre-pandemic that number was in the 4% to 6% range broadly. So, it’s a bit of marker on how much upside. But there’s a lot of moving parts in that number. Obviously, there’s the advertising, there’s investments going on for future growth, and there’s the core profitability and cost structure that our operations are achieving. So, making progress, working hard at it, but it’s a longer road than bouncing back in one or two quarters.

Andy Jassy, CEO

I want to emphasize that we have thoroughly examined all of our businesses. While the improvement in our operating margin and efficiency within our stores is most noticeable due to its size, every business is diligently working to enhance efficiency. As Brian mentioned, we are making significant strides in reducing fulfillment costs across our operations network and stores. Over the past 6 to 9 months, it has been interesting and encouraging to see that as our network has fundamentally changed—having doubled our fulfillment center footprint and built a last-mile transportation network comparable to UPS in just a couple of years—many operational methods that previously worked have now become inefficient due to these changes. This realization has contributed to our regionalization efforts and prompted a comprehensive reevaluation of our operations. We have discovered many more opportunities than we initially anticipated. Therefore, I am optimistic that not only can we return to our pre-pandemic operating margins, but there is also potential for additional improvements from the opportunities we’ve identified.

Operator, Operator

And the next question comes from the line of Brian Nowak with Morgan Stanley.

Brian Nowak, Analyst

I have two, Andy. The first one, you talked a lot about the long-term AI and large language model potential out of AWS. I think there’s a lot of discussion about AWS’s competitive positioning when it comes to these tools. Could you just sort of walk us through 2 or 3 of the key points of differentiation that you think AWS offers and AI tools versus some of the competitors? And then the second one around Echo and Alexa. The neural networks may not be a leading edge of technology now with the rapid emergence of some of these new Large Language Models. How do you think about the key investment priorities for Echo and Alexa going forward? And what’s your view on ROIC around that division? Thanks.

Andy Jassy, CEO

I will try to address both questions together since they're interconnected. It's important to note that Amazon has invested significantly in machine learning for over 25 years, and it is a core part of our operations. This technology underpins our personalized e-commerce recommendations, the Pick Pass in our fulfillment centers, our Go stores, Prime Air drones, and Alexa. Additionally, AWS boasts over 25 machine learning services, making our offerings among the most comprehensive in the industry. The past nine months have seen advancements in Large Language Models and generative AI, which, while existing for some time, have only recently become more effective. These improvements present a substantial opportunity to enhance nearly every customer interaction and facilitate many new experiences that weren't previously feasible. Although this is still in the early stages, we’ve been developing our own Large Language Models for several years, representing a significant investment across the company. When considering this space, I see three main areas. First, all Large Language Models rely on computational power, primarily driven by chips. Currently, many relevant chips, especially GPUs tailored for this workload, are both costly and in short supply. In response, AWS has been creating tailored machine learning chips, including Trainium for training and Inferentia for inference. Most expenses are typically incurred during the training phase, but once these models move into production, the focus shifts to inference. Thus, both aspects are crucial. We have just launched the second versions of Trainium and Inferentia, which offer differentiated performance and pricing. We expect that much of the machine learning training and inference work will be carried out on AWS. Second, building these models is challenging. Creating leading Large Language Models requires significant time and investment, which only a handful of companies will undertake, including Amazon. Most organizations prefer utilizing established foundational models and customizing them for their unique data and needs without exposing their proprietary information. This is where Bedrock comes in; it is a managed foundational model service that allows users to operate foundational models from Amazon, known as Titan, or from other leading providers like AI21, Anthropic, and Stability AI. Customers can tailor these models to fit their specific requirements while maintaining the security and privacy they expect from their AWS applications. Lastly, we have the applications that will be developed on top of these Large Language Models. An example is ChatGPT, but we also plan to create applications ourselves. One area we're excited about is enhancing developer productivity through coding assistance, exemplified by our recently announced CodeWhisperer. By allowing developers to input natural language requests—like wanting to build a video hosting site—CodeWhisperer can generate the necessary code, greatly increasing efficiency by reducing the time spent on rewriting code. Regarding investment priorities for Echo and Alexa, every segment within Amazon is leveraging Large Language Models to enhance customer experiences. This includes our devices division, which is particularly relevant in this context. Our vision for Alexa extends beyond just a smart speaker; we aim to create the best personal assistant globally. This vision is challenging due to its complexity, but advancements in Large Language Models and generative AI substantially enhance our models' efficacy, accelerating our goal. With hundreds of millions of Alexa endpoints across various domains and a robust third-party ecosystem, we are well-positioned to reach our ambitions. We’re building larger, more capable language models, which will significantly expedite our progress toward becoming the world’s best personal assistant while supporting a strong business model.

Operator, Operator

And the next question comes from the line of Colin Sebastian with Baird.

Colin Sebastian, Analyst

I guess, first off, on the International segment, I mean, not only an acceleration in our top line, but also on the margin side. If you could maybe add a little more color on some of the initiatives and improvements there. And then secondly, on the physical stores, including the grocery strategy, maybe any worth kind of going through any updated thoughts you have there around the strategy of optimizing stores across categories. And if there are any changes to the footprint plans for those businesses? Thank you.

Andy Jassy, CEO

Thank you, Colin. I'll address the international aspect first. We observed an increase in growth on an FX-neutral basis, reaching 9% compared to 5% in Q4. The economy in that region seems to be stabilizing, especially in established European countries, where consumer confidence is rising and inflation is decreasing. This aligns with trends we've noticed in North America. We experienced some unexpected positive growth in the international segment during the first quarter, which was encouraging. Although the negative margin has decreased, factors like the improved top line and reductions in some investments contributed to this. While most of these changes are happening in North America, you'll also see improvements in operational efficiency and cost reductions from global programs affecting international operations. It's important to note that our international business includes established countries that are already profitable and resemble North America, albeit at an earlier stage of development as they approach profitability parity. We have introduced Prime benefits in several countries that are progressing faster than we originally saw in North America. We have also significantly expanded our emerging business, entering more than ten new markets in the last five years. If you recall, it took us nine years to achieve breakeven profitability in the U.S., and we are observing a similar trend in many overseas markets. There are additional challenges, such as limited payment methods and underdeveloped infrastructure for transportation and internet services, which may slow adoption, but we are optimistic about the businesses we are building. They exhibit similar characteristics to what we have in North America, such as price selection and convenience, and we are pleased with the traction and new customer engagement we are experiencing with Prime Video in several emerging markets. It was a solid quarter, and we’ll keep refining our cost structure and expanding our businesses in each country. Regarding the grocery segment, we are making steady progress. Our grocery business, which we've had for a while, is quite substantial even though it operates differently from traditional grocery stores. We focus on non-perishable items such as canned goods, packaged foods, pet supplies, personal care, and health and beauty products. In the current cautious consumer environment, the demand for consumables has remained robust, and we are content with that segment of our grocery offering as we aim to meet a wider array of grocery shopping needs. Since most shopping visits still occur in physical stores, we need to enhance our physical presence. We have two primary initiatives: Whole Foods, which has been a leader in the organic grocery market and continues to grow positively, and Amazon Fresh, which we have been developing over the past few years. We wish we had made more progress by now and have tested various concepts but haven't yet found a scalable format. We are working on several experiments and ideas across our numerous locations and are hopeful we will discover a successful approach this year. Despite being a significant business for us today, we believe there is potential for much larger growth within Amazon and for better serving our customers. With the right physical presence, we can provide the grocery items they seek as well as additional products across other categories.

Operator, Operator

And the next question comes from the line of Justin Post with Bank of America.

Justin Post, Analyst

Can you highlight any unusual items in April or the second quarter for comparison? I know last year's second quarter was very strong. I'm considering the linearity throughout the quarter. Also, Andy, thank you for the shareholder letter. It appears that you've identified medical and Kuiper as key investment areas. What led you to choose those? Does the Company plan to break down all the significant investments to provide more transparency on the retail margin structure? Thank you.

Brian Olsavsky, CFO

Yes, thank you, Justin. On AWS, Andy provided a clear overview of the current dynamics among our customers, particularly regarding where they are scaling back workloads and the ongoing strength from customers reaching their contractual limits, which they are extending as they plan for the future. We have strong confidence in our business outlook and recognize the short-term efforts we are making to assist customers in saving costs. Comparing Q2 to Q1, there isn't a significant year-over-year difference in our performance. It’s all about understanding which customers are reducing spending in some areas while expanding in others, and facilitating their transition to the new initiatives they are considering.

Andy Jassy, CEO

In my annual letter, I aimed to clarify our approach to investing, particularly focusing on our significant new investments. I mentioned that we consider several factors: if the investment is successful, will it have a substantial impact on Amazon with the desired return on invested capital? Is there a competitive advantage for us? Do we have confidence in our capabilities in that area, and if not, can we acquire the expertise quickly? If we have favorable answers to these questions, we will proceed with the investment. Some of these investments appear straightforward, such as our efforts in category expansion and international growth within our stores, as well as in new retail market segments where we see potential for large businesses, including business-to-business initiatives and grocery services. For example, our Buy with Prime feature enables customers to leverage their Prime benefits on third-party websites, improving the conversion rate for merchants since Prime members enjoy quick payment options and fast, reliable shipping. However, there are other investments that may not directly align with initial expectations, like AWS, which seemed quite different when we started exploring it in 2003. The decision ultimately transformed our company, despite skepticism from many at the time. I highlighted two key areas in my letter, health care and Kuiper, which we have strong conviction about. Regarding health care, it's a multi-trillion-dollar sector that is particularly fractured in the U.S., and we believe we have unique approaches that can lead to success. Our customers have long requested a pharmacy service, which aligns naturally with our retail business, prompting the launch of Amazon Pharmacy in 2020, which is off to a promising start. Customers are also expressing a desire for broader health care support, and primary care sits at the heart of that experience. The conventional primary care appointment process is outdated and cumbersome, and we believe that significant improvements can be made. We learned from our experiments with Amazon Care, which demonstrated that people appreciated a more streamlined health care experience, although we recognized the need for a different business model. We discovered One Medical, which offers a compelling digital app allowing communication with medical practitioners via chat or video conference. They provide convenient same-day or next-day appointments at physical clinics across the country, and connect patients with health specialists quickly. Furthermore, medications can be shipped directly to patients through Amazon Pharmacy or other pharmacies, creating a vastly improved health experience. We see significant potential in transforming this aspect of health care, and if we succeed in primary care and pharmacy, we can address other customer needs as well. As for Kuiper, it aims to connect millions of households, businesses, and government entities that currently lack reliable internet access. The importance of connectivity is often overlooked; it enables online education, business operations, entertainment access, and shopping. For businesses and governments, consistent internet coverage can profoundly enhance their operations. We believe that Kuiper has the potential to become a significant business, and we’re excited about the interest shown by potential customers across various segments. I've chosen these two examples to highlight some noteworthy initiatives stemming from our investment philosophy, which might not be immediately obvious but could be highly impactful for our company.

Dave Fildes, Vice President of Investor Relations

Thanks for joining us today on the call and for your questions. A replay will be available on our Investor Relations website for at least three months. We appreciate your interest in Amazon and look forward to talking with you again next quarter.