Amazon founder Jeff Bezos will step down from his role as chief executive later this year and transition to the role of executive chair, the company said Tuesday. He will be replaced by Andy Jassy. Bezos has been Amazon's CEO since its founding in 1995. He oversaw its growth from an online bookseller into a $1.7 trillion global retail and logistics behemoth, which has also made Bezos into one of the world's richest people. Jassy has worked for Amazon since 1997 and currently serves as CEO of the company's cloud business, Amazon Web Services, its biggest profit driver. The news came as part of Amazon's fourth-quarter earnings report. The company handily beat Wall Street analysts' projections for both sales and profit, capping a banner year as the pandemic boosted its retail and cloud businesses. Amazon (AMZN) posted quarterly net sales of $125.6 billion, up 44% from the same period in the prior year and well ahead of the $119.7 billion Wall Street analysts had projected. Net income in the quarter hit $7.2 billion - nearly double the $3.7 billion Wall Street predicted and more than double the $3.3 billion in income the company earned in the year-ago quarter. Earnings per diluted share were $14.09. The quarterly results include sales from Prime Day, which was held October 13-14 after being postponed over the summer because of the pandemic. Sales from Prime Day, as well as continued demand for online shopping as Covid-19 cases surged, contributed to 40% year-over-year growth in Amazon's net sales in North America, which totaled more than $75 billion. International sales jumped 57% to nearly $37.5 billion.