There’s a saying in deep sea fishing circles that goes, “Fish-on is not fish-in-the-boat.” It means a hooked fish is not caught until it has actually been reeled in and landed, a very important detail in a sport that’s also notorious for “the big one that got away” stories.
On Tuesday (April 12), Walmart — which also happens to be the nation’s No. 1 retailer of fishing tackle — had its own big catch to talk about, when it landed 51-year-old PayPal exec John Rainey to be its next CFO.
“I’ve closely watched Walmart’s transition to an omnichannel company, and I can’t wait to join the management team,” Rainey said in a statement which noted his June 6 start date, adding that he was “excited and humbled to join such an iconic company at a time when the retail industry continues its transformation.”
Citing Rainey’s proven track record of leading change, at scale, in customer service businesses, Walmart CEO Doug McMillon was happy to talk about his trophy catch, and the importance of luring PayPal’s No. 2 executive to come to Arkansas from San Francisco.
“I’m confident that John’s mix of financial and digital acumen, coupled with his experience leading finance in complex, highly competitive industries, will help us deliver for our customers and shareholders as we continue to transform our company,” McMillon said.
The real hook in all of this is the fact that Rainey has spent the past seven years running the books and overseeing global customer operations for a company at the leading edge of both the buy now, pay later (BNPL) movement and the mass adoption of peer-to-peer payments via PayPal’s vast Venmo franchise.
Rainey comes to a company that has made no secret about its FinTech ambitions, announcing in January that its new Hazel unit, which is run by two former Goldman Sachs consumer finance execs and Ribbit Capital, had acquired, merged and rebranded the financial services operations of ONE as part of its broader super app aspirations.
Amazon’s Innovation and Invention Echo
Never to be outdone, the newly promoted CEO of Amazon was out this week with his first Annual Letter to Shareholders, and a quick scan of Andy Jassy’s 4,500-word screed revealed 16 references to inventing or invention as well as eight references to various forms of innovation.
With that in mind, the wide-ranging review paid special attention to the past and future growth prospects of its Prime Video business, which is increasingly being used as a tool to attract subscribing customers and content producers alike.
“While there is so much progress in Prime Video from where we started, we have more invention in front of us in the next 15 years than the last 15 [years],” Jassy said, “and our team is passionately committed to providing customers with the most expansive collection of compelling content anywhere in the world.”
Without giving specifics, the Amazon chief hinted at further benefits being added to its Prime basket of benefits, while also extolling the long-term gains the Seattle company has built over the past few decades compared to the rapid response it has overseen in the past two years.
Amazon’s consumer business “realized the equivalent of three years’ forecasted growth in about 15 months,” Jassy said. “We spent Amazon’s first 25 years building a very large fulfillment network, and then had to double it in the last 24 months to meet customer demand,” he added, despite 2020 and 2021 being “crazy and unpredictable” years.
Jassy, who previously built and ran Amazon Web Services before taking over the top job from founder Jeff Bezos, also spoke of the different demand and growth trajectories that the massive $1.6 trillion company’s two disparate businesses have experienced.