Amazon Web Services (AWS) was created to solve Amazon's own internal server chaos during the early 2000s.

In the early 2000s, Amazon was struggling with a 'messy' architectural sprawl that hindered its ability to scale. Developers spent roughly 70% of their time on 'muck'—the repetitive task of building storage and database components—rather than actual coding. This inefficiency led CEO Jeff Bezos and CTO Werner Vogels to mandate a shift toward a service-oriented architecture (SOA) to streamline operations.The formal plan for AWS began to take shape during a 2003 retreat at Bezos's house, where executives realized their core competency had become running efficient, scalable infrastructure. This internal utility was first commercialized in 2004 with the launch of Simple Queue Service (SQS). However, the true revolution occurred in 2006 with the release of the Simple Storage Service (S3) and Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2).By providing on-demand computing power, AWS eliminated the need for startups to invest in expensive physical hardware. According to Synergy Research Group, AWS maintained a 31% share of the global cloud infrastructure market as of late 2023. Financially, AWS has become Amazon's primary engine of growth, often accounting for over 50% of the company's total operating income despite representing a smaller fraction of total revenue.