Amazon CEO Andy Jassy announced on Wednesday, in a message to employees, that Peter DeSantis, a long-serving AWS executive, will head a newly established AI-focused organization within the company.
This new division will be responsible for Amazon’s AI models, including Nova, along with silicon development and quantum computing, all of which contribute to making AI tools faster and more efficient.
DeSantis has dedicated 27 years to Amazon, including eight years as an SVP for AWS, the cloud provider that supports approximately one-third of the internet. Amazon emphasized its dedication to AI for enterprise applications at AWS’s recent re:Invent event, making the formation of a new team from AWS leadership a logical move.
“With our Nova 2 models recently launched at re:Invent, our custom silicon rapidly expanding, and the advantages of optimizing across models, chips, and cloud software and infrastructure, we aimed to free Peter to concentrate his energy, innovation cycles, and leadership on these emerging domains,” Jassy noted.
Amazon’s heightened focus on AI comes as the company seeks to strengthen its position in the AI race, perhaps more through investments than its own proprietary innovations. Last month, AWS announced a $50 billion investment in the U.S. government’s AI infrastructure. Amazon is also reportedly in discussions to invest $10 billion in OpenAI, and has already invested $8 billion in Anthropic, a rival to OpenAI.