> “Cost center” doesn’t mean “unprofitable department”.
That's unnecessarily pedantic. A cost center is an organizational subunit that incurs cost but does not directly contribute to the company’s profits. Since I said "department" and "cost center" it really should be clear what was meant. Why, it is just like the article itself using "Amazon" as both a noun and a verb!
> And actually two of the three segments appearing in Amazon financial reports are profitable.
Amazon had 6 segments in 2017 not 3.
If you look at the Operating Profit, Operating Margin, and P/E considering the context of my comment about AWS vs. the other departments, I think you will see why AWS has kept Amazon (and AMZN) afloat.
That's unnecessarily pedantic. A cost center is an organizational subunit that incurs cost but does not directly contribute to the company’s profits. Since I said "department" and "cost center" it really should be clear what was meant. Why, it is just like the article itself using "Amazon" as both a noun and a verb!
> And actually two of the three segments appearing in Amazon financial reports are profitable.
Amazon had 6 segments in 2017 not 3.
If you look at the Operating Profit, Operating Margin, and P/E considering the context of my comment about AWS vs. the other departments, I think you will see why AWS has kept Amazon (and AMZN) afloat.