Amazon

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2021 was a tumultuous year for the e-commerce giant. Founder Jeff Bezos formally stepped down as president and CEO on July 5, 2021, and Andy Jassy, longtime head of the Amazon Web Services (AWS) cloud juggernaut, took the reins. The company struggled with labor shortages, a massive surge in employee turnover, and the biggest unionization push since its founding. But those obstacles didn’t stop Amazon from growing its headcount by a net of 310,000 employees in 2021. It also increased its minimum hourly wage from $15 to $18 in September of that year. Amazon’s streaming service sowed the seeds for further growth as the company acquired Hollywood studio MGM in an $8.5 billion deal. Amazon Prime Day sales in 2021 reached a record-breaking total of $11.19 billion. And overall, the retail and cloud-computing powerhouse grew revenue by more than 21% and brought in $33.3 billion in profits, a stunning 56.4% increase over 2020.