Exclusive w/ -- Amazon once had audacious plans for remaking physical retail, including a secret effort to take on Target. Now it’s closing stores and pausing the opening of ones that have already been completed.
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Theo Wayt
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Reporter covering Amazon. Email: theo@theinformation.com Text/Call/Signal: 917 300 8909
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Amazon planned to do a Target-sized big box store, code-named Project Reese, as and I report in this deep dive story. Now, like other parts of Amazon's store ambitions, it's no more.
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kudos here to . While you were huddling inside, lamenting the darkest days of winter, scrolling apps, Theo was peering into Amazon Fresh windows, haranguing city planners. twitter.com/theo_wayt/stat
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New: Amazon plans to close some grocery and convenience stores, CFO Brian Olsavsky said Thursday. The Information reported in December that Amazon had frozen new US Fresh store openings and that 'zombie' stores were piling up across the US.
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Amazon Sees AWS Slowdown Lasting For Several Quarters
"Amazon’s drone is effectively a five-year-old who needs to hold hands to cross the street. A drone designed to replace humans needs humans to go places."
A good analysis of Amazon's drone program from that cites our story from yesterday.
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After a splashy launch, sources say Amazon Prime Air made drone deliveries to <10 houses between December 29 and mid-January; records: the FAA limits the drones ( / The Information)
theinformation.com/articles/amazo
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Despite the setbacks, Amazon continues to hype up Prime Air. In November, Prime Air VP David Carbon said Amazon planned to deliver 500 million packages annually by drone by 2030. That goal became an office joke.
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While rivals like Wing and Walmart are subject to looser FAA rules and have made thousands of deliveries, Amazon is stuck using labor-intensive workarounds. In California, the company has had to use spotters to make sure cars aren't coming when its drones cross the street.
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New : Amazon's much-hyped drone delivery program had made deliveries to fewer than 10 houses as of mid January. Blame FAA safety restrictions, which bar Amazon from flying over people or roads without explicit permission.
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Amazon's $1.7b acquisition of iRobot could be in trouble, if the Roomba maker’s stock price is any indication. iRobot shares are now trading more than a quarter below Amazon’s proposed buyout price as investors weigh whether regulators will challenge it.
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"If UPS workers were to walk out, it would likely be impossible for the postal service and rival FedEx Corp. to cover the volume from UPS’s customers, which include Amazon."
Amazon Fresh is hiking the fees it charges on grocery delivery orders. Comes one week after the company laid off employees in its retail division and several months into a freeze on new U.S. Fresh stores.
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"The current thing? Rumors are coursing through Silicon Valley that Andreessen may want to buy The Washington Post—if Jeff Bezos is indeed ready to part with it." theinformation.com/articles/citiz via
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"A Post employee... stopped him and asked why the company was laying people off without offering buyouts first... Mr. Bezos responded that he was at The Post to listen, not answer questions and underscored his commitment to The Post’s journalism."
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Amazon says the $377 million figure, which comes from its own site, is outdated. Amazon has actually donated $500 million through Smile, a spokesperson says.
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Amazon ended the AmazonSmile charity donation feature today at the same time it laid off thousands of employees. Amazon has donated $377 million to charities selected by customers since it launched AmazonSmile in 2013, according to the company.
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Scoop: Amazon has started telling some corporate employees in India that their roles are being eliminated, marking the opening salvo in mass layoffs that the company has said will begin next week.
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Amazon Expands ‘Buy With Prime’ to More U.S. Merchants, Adds Product Reviews
Um, you are being kind. What a weird thing for them to just rip off so much later.
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If this Wall Street Journal story on Wonder that ran today looks familiar, it’s because and I basically wrote the same thing back in November.
theinformation.com/articles/marc-
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Amazon Plans to Lay Off More Than 18,000 Workers, Mostly in Retail and HR
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"Youngsters in second-tier Pakistani cities aspire to be Amazon sellers, according to market watchers. Amazon sellers are regarded as hotshots, and desirable candidates for arranged marriages." restofworld.org/2023/amazon-pa via
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Bezos Could Be the Real Winner from Amazon’s Sports Deals
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New: An Amazon Prime Sports app is in the works, per
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We could be nearing an era where sports will essentially be a premium tier business… which would make it more niche, but leagues may have done this to themselves
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Exclusive w/ @mvpeers -- Amazon is working on a stand-alone sports streaming app. The move suggests CEO Andy Jassy is considering new ways to squeeze revenue out of Amazon's pricey streaming rights deals, such as a possible separate sports tier of Prime. theinformation.com/articles/amazo
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Source: Amazon is working on a standalone app for watching sports, decluttering the Prime Video app; Andy Jassy recently reaffirmed Amazon's video ambitions ( / The Information)
theinformation.com/articles/amazo
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Exclusive w/ -- Amazon is working on a stand-alone sports streaming app. The move suggests CEO Andy Jassy is considering new ways to squeeze revenue out of Amazon's pricey streaming rights deals, such as a possible separate sports tier of Prime.
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"Amazon’s bubble-lined plastic bags carry the recycling logo that’s often criticized for confusing consumers into thinking its packaging is easily recycled... Most American recyclers can’t process them."
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For Sale on eBay: A Military Database of Fingerprints and Iris Scans
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Amazon seems to have halted opening new Fresh stores -- as a result, there are a bunch with finished buildouts and Amazon paying rent, but no employees or product or customers.
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Stopped by one of these in New Jersey couple of weeks ago. Did hear someone or something inside, but nothing major and otherwise seemed pretty dead. twitter.com/theo_wayt/stat
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Amazon got Amazoned:
"The door of the Holmdel store was covered with several weeks’ worth of missed package notices from UPS."
Great story about Amazon's zombie stores from
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It's based on a similar bill that California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed in 2021.
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New York Gov. Kathy Hochul just signed the Warehouse Worker Protection Act, which restricts the use of work quotas in warehouses (including Amazon's, of course).
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