InformationWeek names Amazon CTO Werner Vogels Chief of the Year

“If we’re on the cusp of the computer industry’s next major architecture, the one beyond client-server, Vogels has played a key role in getting us to this point. A former researcher in Cornell University’s computer science department, where he specialized in large-scale distributed systems, Vogels joined Amazon in 2004 to help the e-retailer design and scale its IT infrastructure to handle workloads many times Amazon’s own.”

“Vogels’ name and face are often associated with Amazon’s cloud, but AWS isn’t a one-man show. Senior VP Andy Jassy conceived the business model five years ago and has had his hand at the wheel ever since. VP Charlie Bell is the lead technical manager of AWS. VP Adam Selipsky is the liaison to the 440,000 developers who have signed up so far. Vogels, Bell, and Selipsky report to Jassy, and Amazon balked at our suggestion that one of them could be singled out. But we did it anyway, selecting Vogels as InformationWeek’s Chief of the Year, our highest editorial honor.”