LOS ANGELES—TV anchor Lauren Sanchez, who is in a relationship with Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, filed for divorce the day after Bezos’ divorce was finalized on Thursday, April 4.
Sanchez and talent agent Patrick Whitesell, her husband of 14 years, both filed divorce papers on Friday, April 5. They’re seeking joint custody of their two kids.
The Bezoses
When the divorce is complete, which is expected to happen in about 90 days, MacKenzie Bezos will have a 4 percent stake in Amazon.She will be worth at least $35 billion after receiving a quarter of Bezos' Amazon shares, according to a court filing pending approval of their divorce.
He’ll be Amazon’s largest shareholder, and he’ll also keep voting control of MacKenzie Bezos’s shares, according to a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.
The divorce ends a 25-year marriage that played a role in creating one of the world’s most valuable companies.
The Bezoses met in New York in the early 1990s while working at a hedge fund. They married just six months after they began dating, Jeff Bezos has said.
Not long after that, he quit his job to start an online bookstore and the Bezoses took a cross-country road trip to Seattle, which was chosen for its high number of technology workers. While his wife did the driving, Jeff Bezos wrote a business plan. By 1995, Amazon was operating out of a garage, with MacKenzie Bezos helping out.
Amazon has grown way beyond those humble beginnings. It now produces movies, runs the Whole Foods grocery chain and has become the leader in voice-activated speakers. The company has become so large that it plans to build a second headquarters in Arlington, Virginia.
MacKenzie Bezos, a novelist, said in a tweet Thursday that she was “excited” about her future plans, but didn’t say what they were.
“Grateful for the past as I look forward to what comes next,” she said in the tweet.