U.S. public entities and enterprises accelerate adoption of Amazon Business

Amazon Business is a global procurement solution now used by more than five million businesses, ranging from sole proprietors to multinational enterprises with tens of thousands of employees on a single account. Since launching in the U.S. in 2015, we have expanded to eight additional countries and reached $25 billion in worldwide annualized sales, more than half of which are from third-party sellers.

In the U.S., our two fastest growing customer segments are public entities and enterprises—we serve 45 states, 90 of the 100 largest cities and counties, and many other public entities. In addition, more than 80 of the Fortune 100 companies currently use Amazon Business, including Citigroup, Intel, Cisco, and ExxonMobil. Here’s what some of our customers have said about using Amazon Business:

• “Amazon Business gives users the autonomy to find what they need [to purchase] in a way that’s familiar, easy, and intuitive. It lets us focus on the strategic purchases we make for the university. It has changed the way I think about purchasing.” - Provided by the Director of Procurement Services, University of Washington
• “We always look for ways to make our processes more efficient and save money for the state. We started working with Amazon Business to give our agencies the familiar buying experience they use at home, but with the open, fair, and transparent process we need for state government. They had us up and running in two months—it was the easiest implementation we’ve ever had.” - Carol Wilson, Chief Procurement Officer, State of Connecticut
• “At our scale, every percentage point counts…Considering the sheer size of our procurement organization and our purchasing activities, it adds up fast.” - Nassim Kefi, Global IT Procurement Manager, ExxonMobil
• “With Amazon Business, we can focus on what the data means rather than on whether it is accurate. We used to review purchasing data every two or three months. Now we can look at it in real time, which makes us much more agile in our decision making.” - Mark Arrigotti, Head of Global Procure2Pay, Uber

What makes Amazon Business unique is that we enable hundreds of thousands of third-party sellers to sell to businesses of all sizes. A report by Censeo Consulting found that 93% of small businesses surveyed faced significant barriers to reaching public sector customers through traditional sales channels, and 85% agree that the overall public sector procurement process is difficult to participate in.

As a company, Amazon spends billions of dollars every year to help small- and medium-sized businesses around the globe succeed. In addition to infrastructure, personnel, tools and services, our investments go toward things like our certified seller program, which highlights those with one of 14 nationally-recognized certifications such small, minority, woman, veteran, and LGBT-owned businesses. Here’s what some of our certified sellers have said about using Amazon Business:

• “Amazon Business sales are an important part of our growth, and to bring attention to our customer’s satisfaction overall. The ability to identify as a successful, Black-owned business is not only beneficial to us, but to other companies like us that might feel discouraged in a difficult business environment—our hope is we can inspire other minority-owned businesses like Aldevra to remain adaptable, think creatively, and enable each other to be successful.” - Rodney Marshall, Founder & CEO, Aldevra
• “There’s no way I could hire enough marketing people to make our name known throughout the country the way that Amazon Business has. We found customers we didn’t even know were out there.” - Rita Bonarrigo, Founder, The Office Tex

With our Diversity Certifications program, a purchasing organization can direct spending, consistently and across all employees, to suppliers that have certifications or are local to the business zip code. Customers appreciate the ways Amazon Business helps them find sellers with these certifications, which prevents administrators from having to review every purchase to ensure compliance. Here’s what some of our customers have said:

• "We're thrilled to collaborate with Amazon Business to create a solution that will help our local and small business community find work opportunities with our city government. Now, more than ever, we need to be engaging and supporting our independent vendors and mom-and-pop businesses." - Mayor Francis Suarez, City of Miami
• “Cisco’s purpose is to power an inclusive future for all. That means everyone. Partnering with Amazon Business, we are able to easily discover diverse-owned businesses, increasing their visibility, and ultimately spend, across our company.” - Denise Lombard, Director of Responsible Procurement, Cisco Systems

While Amazon Business serves the unique needs of a multinational enterprises, we have also launched features for small business customers to streamline their administrative work, saving time and money that may have otherwise been spent on additional software. For example, our integration with Intuit QuickBooks, an accounting software, allows customers to easily integrate into their accounting system their purchases on Amazon Business instead of having to do manual reconciliation.

Similarly, we enable public entities to gain transparency into purchasing across their organization and more easily achieve compliance with our purchasing solution. More than 75,000 non-profit organizations and 92 of the 100 largest hospital systems, as well as universities, daycares, restaurants, and small businesses, use Amazon Business today. Here’s what some mission-driven organizations have said about purchasing on Amazon Business:

• "Amazon was an absolute life-saver for our department. Logistically managing to send gift boxes to filmmakers and jurors around the world for this year’s virtual Sundance Film Festival would have been impossible without Amazon's help. The speed with which they were delivered and the customer service in dealing with issues was exceptional - we and the filmmakers are extremely grateful." - Tony Coppola, Manager, Festival Artist Relations, Sundance Institute
• “Amazon Business is a key partner in bringing learning to life for students across the country. Empowering teacher wisdom is core to our mission at DonorsChoose, and Amazon Business helps make that possible by giving teachers an easy way to shop for resources that will help their specific students thrive.” - Charles Best, Founder, DonorsChoose
• “The United Service Organization (USO) has several hundred users around the globe using Amazon Business. With this Business Prime incentive, we’ve been able to save money, and in turn create more efficiencies to strengthen America’s military service members by keeping them connected to family, home, and country throughout their service to the nation. Things like approving invoices and reconciling receipts for expenses used to take five to seven days, and now it takes two. What used to be a manual process that took up much of our time is now almost entirely automated. This reduces processing times and allows us to provide autonomy to center directors to get what they need more quickly and efficiently." - Rick Quaintance, Senior Director of Procurement and Contracts Management, United Service Organization
• “Amazon Business ensures National Association of Nonprofit Organizations & Executives (NANOE) members save money, work easier, and have the supplies they require to accomplish their important missions. Simply put, Amazon Business for Nonprofits is a matter of financial stewardship—it allows charities to keep more of the dollars their donors so generously share. We can’t recommend it enough.” - Jimmy LaRose, Co-Founder, National Association of Nonprofit Organizations & Executives

Looking ahead, we continue listening to feedback from customers and selling partners. We are obsessed with innovating on their behalf to deliver what they need to be successful in meeting the demands of the future workplace. We are excited about what we have accomplished over the last six years, and look forward to what lies ahead.