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Tag: Amazon

  • Walmart is the Roman Empire of Retail

    Walmart is the Roman Empire of Retail

    Walmart is the Roman Empire of retail, says Burt Flickinger, Managing Director of SRG. Walmart announced an impressive earnings and revenue beat that told the story investors want to hear. Walmart is winning the retail wars, especially against arch-rival Amazon. “Like Hannibal and the Carthaginians, Amazon is starting to go the wrong way.” says Flickinger. “Big win for Walmart today and they will accelerate that in the next two to seven years.”

    Burt Flickinger, Managing Director of SRG, a consumer industry business consulting firm, discussed how Walmart is winning the retail wars in an interview on Fox Business:

    Walmart is the Roman Empire of Retail

    This earnings report just reinforces its winning. Amazon is going sideways. This is a reenactment of the Punic Wars, Rome versus Carthage. Walmart is the Roman empire of retail. Like Hannibal and the Carthaginians, Amazon is starting to go the wrong way. Big win for Walmart today and they will accelerate that in the next two to seven years.

    What’s doubly impressive, we talk to a lot of vendors and shoppers around the world, what the vendors are saying is Walmart is reinvesting all the PPA (price and promotional allowances) in lower prices. Lower prices normally mean lower margins and lower revenue. But in this case, the shopper is shifting to Walmart.

    Walmart strategically saw all the land-based businesses like Payless and all the retailers from toys to sporting goods going out of business. They had great sales on land and not so good online. Walmart is winning both ways. Amazon, with all the trouble they’re having with Whole Foods, can’t capitalize. Walmart is running the table.

    This Says it All for US Retail

    This says it all for US retail. The well capitalized highly capable retailers are winning and if it’s a one man show, like Bezos running the show, you could be Alexander the Great, you could be Hannibal out of Carthage, but one general isn’t going to win a war. Recent (lower) retail sales numbers were a combination of a couple things. One is Jerome Powell scared the market, especially high to mid-end, didn’t spend as much. Also, consumers were a little bit scared toward the end of the year. Walmart, off price, low price, did very well, but full price full service struggled and that’s why the numbers were bad.

    Walmart comp sales increased 4.2 percent, just like Steve Jobs and Apple with their great campaign Think Different with Muhammad Ali, Walmart is thinking different with Doug McMillon. It’s evolved from a company of family management to professional management. Walmart had 40 percent growth online.

    Walmart Ads Are Really Connecting

    Before, Walmart looked at advertising as an expense. But as Jerry Della Femina said, most of the Super Bowl ads were pretty pathetic. Walmart was one that stood out because it advertised Walmart online and Walmart in-store. The Walmart ads are really connecting with consumers, a United Nations of consumers.

    They’re reaching everybody around the world with better prices and better service. Doug McMillon has invested in inventory and has invested in store staffing, first to raise wages with some push from the UFCW. They are hitting on all cylinders. The biggest problem now is they can’t handle all of the volume they are seeing on the weekends.


  • Amazon Makes Major Workplace Change in Alleged Attempt to Combat Unionization

    Amazon Makes Major Workplace Change in Alleged Attempt to Combat Unionization

    Amazon is prohibiting off-duty warehouse workers from entering its buildings in an alleged effort to combat unionization.

    According to AP News, Amazon informed its employees via the company’s internal app. Employees are not allowed to come into Amazon’s buildings on their days off or before or after their shifts.

    Amazon has a well-established reputation for aggressively combating organization efforts. The company has been accused of trying to intimidate workers during previous organization attempts and has even resorted to using Pinkerton detectives to keep tabs on such efforts.

    The company denies its latest move has anything to do with combatting organization efforts, insisting it’s more about employee safety.

    “There’s nothing more important than the safety of our employees and the physical security of our buildings,” Amazon spokesperson Kelly Nantel told AP News. “This policy regarding building access applies to building interiors and working areas. It does not limit employee access to non-working areas outside of our facilities.”

    Employees aren’t buying it, believing the measure is a direct threat to their efforts.

    “On our days off, we come to work and we engage our co-workers in the break rooms,” said Rev. Ryan Brown, an Amazon warehouse worker in Garner, North Carolina, who is working to organize his fellow workers.

    “This was a direct response to that, to try to stop organizing by any means necessary,” Brown said.

  • One Is Good, Two Is Better: Amazon May Debut Second Prime Day

    One Is Good, Two Is Better: Amazon May Debut Second Prime Day

    Amazon is reportedly planning for a second Prime Day, potentially slated for the fourth quarter of 2022.

    Prime Day is Amazon’s shopping event exclusively for its Prime members. Normally held once a year, the event includes steep discounts on popular items across the e-commerce platform. According to Business Insider, the company has sent out notices to retailers inviting them to submit promotional deals for a Prime Fall Deal Event.

    “Prime Fall Deal Event is a shopping event,” one of the messages said. “Submit recommended Lightning Deals for Prime Fall Deal Event Week for a chance to have your deal selected for Prime Fall Deal Event!” read another one.

    The standard Prime Day event is scheduled for July 12 and 13. Given that some sellers were asked to deliver their promotions, called Lightning Deal, for the new event by July 22, or September 2 in some cases, it’s clear Amazon is preparing for a second event after the normal Prime Day.

    It’s believed the company may be pushing for a second Prime Day event to help rejuvenate sales after posting its first quarterly loss since 2015. While the company was on top of the world during the height of the pandemic, e-commerce spending has slowed as things have slowly returned to normal.

    The move also comes at a time when Amazon is facing increased competition from Walmart, with the latter unveiling its own Walmart+ Weekend, a direct counter to Amazon’s Prime Day.

  • Battle of the AIs: Walmart Takes on Amazon

    Battle of the AIs: Walmart Takes on Amazon

    Walmart is looking to challenge Amazon using a tool the latter already relies on: artificial intelligence (AI).

    Amazon is the world’s leading e-commerce platform and has been challenging Walmart, Target, and other traditional brands in the broader retail market. A key to Amazon’s success has been its use of AI and machine learning (ML) for more than two decades. According to TheStreet, Walmart is getting in on the action, testing its own AI for the last few years.

    While Amazon made headlines for its new Proteus and Cardinal warehouse robots, its use of AI goes far beyond robots. The company uses AI and ML to handle multiple aspects of customer service and delivery, including product suggestions, re-order reminders, and more.

    Walmart is looking to roll out similar solutions in an effort to better compete with the e-commerce giant. As TheStreet points out, the pandemic put Walmart’s plans into overdrive. Between labor shortages and wage increases, AI is suddenly a critical component now, rather than being something that may be useful in the future.

    As part of its initiative, Walmart purchased just over 10% of AI firm Symbotic Inc. The company plans to use Symbotic to help run its distribution centers and relieve its employees of some of the manual, labor-intensive tasks.

    Once the realm of science fiction, the last few years have helped make AI an everyday reality that companies of all sizes depend on. Just ask Walmart.

  • Report: American Innovation and Choice Online Act Will Drive Inflation

    Report: American Innovation and Choice Online Act Will Drive Inflation

    A new report by Committee to Unleash Prosperity economists says an antitrust bill making its way through Congress “will make inflation worse.”

    The American Innovation and Choice Online Act is a piece of antitrust legislation introduced by Senators Amy Klobuchar, Chuck Grassley, and John Kennedy. The bill’s aim is to reduce the influence of Big Tech and help level the playing field for smaller companies, as well as better serve consumers. According to the report by Dr. Arthur B. Laffer and John Barrington Burke, the bill will actually make things worse for consumers by increasing inflation.

    “Allegations of monopolistic pricing behavior in the technology sector are misplaced,” the authors write. “We show that many of the technology companies that would be affected by the antitrust bills before Congress have driven dramatic reductions in prices paid by consumers. The Klobuchar bill could add dramatically to the prices that consumers pay for routine tech services from package deliveries, to cell phones, to search engine services.”

    The report makes the case that Big Tech firms are actually not monopolies, with the tech industry being less concentrated than the average US industry. The report also argues that the antitrust legislation before Congress would significantly weaken US tech innovation and cripple the digital economy’s penchant for lowering prices.

    This latest report joins a growing chorus of criticism of the American Innovation and Choice Online Act bill. The Independent Women’s Voice said the “bill is not about protecting competition in America, but expanding regulatory control over a handful of large tech corporations, even if to the detriment of consumers.”

    Similarly, Amazon has said the bill would severely impact its Amazon Prime service, even going so far as to say the bill primarily targeted the e-commerce giant.

    “Oddly, and inappropriately, this legislation is targeted at only one U.S. retailer—Amazon,” the company said.

    It remains to be seen if the bill will be passed and signed into law. While there is nearly unprecedented bipartisan support for antitrust legislation, the voices against the bill are certainly stacking up.

  • Microsoft Azure Is a Major Threat to AWS

    Microsoft Azure Is a Major Threat to AWS

    Multiple reports are showing that Microsoft Azure is increasingly becoming a major threat to AWS in the cloud space.

    AWS is the current market leader among public cloud providers, with Microsoft Azure in second place and Google Cloud in third. Despite AWS’s lead, according to the Flexera 2022 State of the Cloud Report, Azure usage has surpassed AWS in several instances, representing the first time this has happened in 11 years of Flexera’s reporting:

    As in previous years, AWS, Azure and Google Cloud Platform are the top three public cloud providers. But for the first time, Azure has closed the gap with AWS, while other cloud providers have not shown much growth. For each public cloud provider, respondents specified whether they’re running significant workloads in that cloud, running some workloads, experimenting, plan to use it or had no plans to use it.

    Interestingly, Azure took the lead in overall breadth of adoption among organizations:

    Azure passed AWS for breadth of adoption among enterprises. Google Cloud Platform has the highest percentage for experimentation (23 percent) and Oracle Cloud Infrastructure has the highest percentage of plan to use (twelve percent), which could drive more adoption in future years.

    Azure also scored a win among “enterprises running some or significant workloads on the platforms.” While Azure tied with AWS at 47% of organizations using it for significant workloads, it surpassed AWS among organizations using it for some workloads, at 33% vs 30%.

    Of the top six cloud providers, Azure was the only one that saw its adoption rate increase year-over-year, coming in at 80% in 2022 vs 76% in 2021. In contrast, AWS adoption rates dropped in 2022 to 77%, down from 79% in 2021. Similarly, Google dropped from 49% to 48% and Oracle dropped from 32% to 27%. IBM Cloud’s adoption rate stayed steady at 25%, while Alibaba dropped from 13% to 11%.

    While Flexera’s report is telling enough, it’s supported by a new report from Credit Suisse. According to Investing.com, Credit Suisse analysts outlined how “Azure has grown meaningfully faster than AWS” and, as companies transition to the cloud, “the full multi-year impact of Azure’s growth opportunity is still not properly reflected in consensus estimates.”

    Overall, the two reports are excellent news for Microsoft and dovetail with previous reports demonstrating the growth potential of Azure.

  • Amazon Turns to Robots to Address Warehouse Safety

    Amazon Turns to Robots to Address Warehouse Safety

    Amazon is doubling down on robots in an effort to improve its warehouse safety, unveiling fully autonomous models.

    Amazon is sometimes criticized for having higher warehouse injury rates than the industry average. In 2021, its injury rates among warehouse workers went up some 20%. CEO Andy Jassy, while saying its injury rates are “misunderstood,” nonetheless emphasized the company’s commitment to improving safety. Two big steps in that direction are its Proteus and Cardinal warehouse robots.

    Amazon’s robotics efforts have their roots in Kiva, a robotics company Amazon acquired a decade ago. While some speculated Amazon was looking to replace people, it has developed Kiva’s tech to assist human workers and make their workplace safer, as the company outlines in a blog post.

    Proteus is the company’s first fully autonomous robot. Integrating an autonomous robot in a warehouse with human workers presents safety challenges of its own, but Amazon believes they’ve cracked the code.

    Proteus autonomously moves through our facilities using advanced safety, perception, and navigation technology developed by Amazon. The robot was built to be automatically directed to perform its work and move around employees—meaning it has no need to be confined to restricted areas. It can operate in a manner that augments simple, safe interaction between technology and people—opening up a broader range of possible uses to help our employees—such as the lifting and movement of GoCarts, the non-automated, wheeled transports used to move packages through our facilities.

    Similarly, the company’s Cardinal robot is designed to handle the twisting and lifting that goes along with finding and retrieving a single package from a pile of packages.

    Enter Cardinal, the robotic workcell that uses advanced artificial intelligence (AI) and computer vision to nimbly and quickly select one package out of a pile of packages, lift it, read the label, and precisely place it in a GoCart to send the package on the next step of its journey. Cardinal reduces the risk of employee injuries by handling tasks that require lifting and turning of large or heavy packages or complicated packing in a confined space.

    After becoming CEO, Andy Jassy looked for a “silver bullet” that would improve warehouse safety in one fell swoop, ultimately realizing there was no single thing to magically address the issues.

    “But, we still have a ways to go, and we’ll approach it like we do other customer experiences—we’ll keep learning, inventing, and iterating until we have more transformational results,” he said. “We won’t be satisfied until we do.”

  • Amazon’s Global Corporate Affairs Group Prepares to Flatten Hiring

    Amazon’s Global Corporate Affairs Group Prepares to Flatten Hiring

    In yet another indication of an economic downturn, Amazon is reportedly preparing to flatten hiring and budget growth for its Global Corporate Affairs (GCA) group in 2023.

    The GCA group is responsible for Amazon’s corporate communications, lobbying, and public policy. In an internal memo seen by Business Insider, the group is preparing to flatten both its hiring and its budget for 2023, as a result of pullback the company is experiencing as the pandemic winds down.

    Amazon experienced explosive growth through most of the pandemic, with the company serving as a lifeline for people quarantining and isolating at home. As things have begun to return to normal, however, the company has suddenly found itself with a glut of warehouse space and even missed expectations for its first quarter financial results.

    Interestingly, Amazon took issue with Insider’s reporting, saying “most” of their reporting on the story was “incorrect,” but failed to give any specific details. Amazon did provide Insider with the following statement:

    “We continue to hire this year and plan to continue investing as the business grows into next year, albeit at different levels based on the individual teams and the stage of the businesses and topics they support. Of course, as we do every year when we plan, we will be looking to find efficiencies in our operations,” the spokesperson said.

  • Amazon Working On Its Largest-Ever Warehouse in California

    Amazon Working On Its Largest-Ever Warehouse in California

    California is about to be home to Amazon’s largest warehouse yet, one coming in at nearly 4.1 million square feet.

    Amazon experienced major growth during the pandemic as individuals turned to online shopping in record numbers. The company went on a massive hiring spree, and had been expanding its warehouse footprint as well. According to The Seattle Times, Amazon leased a property in the summer of 2021 and has been working to transform it into a five-story, 97-foot-tall building with 4,055,890 square feet of space.

    The expansion comes at an odd time for Amazon. Despite the record growth of the past couple of years, a return to normal has taken a toll on the e-commerce giant. The company recently reported its first quarterly loss in seven years, prompting it to reign in some of its expansion efforts, including the expansion of its warehouse footprint.

    Multiple outlets have reported that the company wants to get rid of 10 to 30 million square feet of warehouse real estate, although that doesn’t necessarily mean the Ontario location is one of those at risk. Having a single 4.1 million square foot warehouse could have significant advantages over several separate locations that cumulatively come in at a comparable size. It’s also likely that Amazon could have trouble offloading the location, as there are few companies that could make use of such a massive property.

    “I’m not sure they’d be able to find another single user for space of that size,” Joshua Ohl, senior market analyst for real estate data firm CoStar Group, told The Seattle Times. “From what I’ve heard, Amazon has been placing more of its older facilities on the sublease market that have less automation, fewer (high-level loading docks) and lower clear heights.”

    The coming months should be interesting for Amazon, as well as the retail and e-commerce markets in general. Some business leaders, such as JPMorgan’s Jamie Dimon and Tesla’s Elon Musk, are warning of major economic headwinds in the near future. If those predictions are true, it could spell trouble for Amazon, as well as its rivals.

  • Amazon Cries Foul Over US Antitrust Bill

    Amazon Cries Foul Over US Antitrust Bill

    Amazon is fighting back against a bill making its way through Congress, one that would prevent tech companies from favoring their own products and services.

    The American Innovation and Choice Online Act was introduced by Senators Amy Klobuchar, Chuck Grassley, and John Kennedy, and has a companion bill making its way through the House, sponsored by Representative David Cicilline. A key element of the bill is a prohibition against companies favoring their own services. In a blog post, however, Amazon says the bill unfairly targets it.

    In particular, Amazon says its Amazon Prime service would be one of the biggest casualties. Despite investing some $100 billion in building out its infrastructure to support Prime’s one to two-day delivery, the new bill would force Amazon to open up Prime to third-party logistic providers, allowing them to fulfill orders.

    Read more: Amazon Warning Sellers About Congress’ Antitrust Efforts

    Amazon outlines the issues in its blog post:

    Such a mandate would make it difficult, and potentially impossible in practice, for Amazon and our selling partners to offer products with Prime’s free two-day shipping (let alone one-day). We’ve tried allowing our selling partners to use other logistics providers to get Prime-eligible products to customers; unfortunately, these providers were not able to consistently deliver in the timeframes Prime customers have come to expect (meeting our “delivery promise” is something we measure and monitor extremely closely). Were this legislation to become law, it would substantially degrade the value and quality of Prime, as many of the products sold in our store today with Prime’s one- to two-day delivery promise would be undeliverable in that time frame.

    Amazon makes the case that degrading its marketplace, including its Prime service, would hurt countless small businesses that have built their livelihood around selling on Amazon.

    Amazon also believes the bill is specifically target it, while excluding its rivals:

    Oddly, and inappropriately, this legislation is targeted at only one U.S. retailer—Amazon. This has been accomplished by requiring a market value of at least $550 billion to qualify for regulation. We don’t believe this threshold to be unintentional; but rather, targeted and intentional. In 2021, Walmart had annual revenues of $559 billion, nearly $90 billion more than Amazon. CVS had annual revenues of $292 billion; Costco, $196 billion; and Target, $106 billion. But Walmart is excluded despite also being a large retailer that allows small businesses to sell in its online marketplace. Similarly, Target, which is headquartered in Sen. Klobuchar’s home state of Minnesota, is excluded even though it too operates an online marketplace for sellers. And CVS, which is headquartered in Rep. Cicilline’s home state of Rhode Island, is excluded despite being one of the U.S.’s largest retailers, largest health insurance companies, and largest pharmacy benefit managers, all at the same time.

    Amazon’s argument regarding Walmart is further boosted by the fact that the latter company has unveiled its Walmart+ Weekend, it’s own take on Amazon’s Prime Day, further blurring the line between brick-and-mortar retailer and e-commerce giant.

    Interestingly, Amazon isn’t the only entity to come out against the bill. In fact, the Independent Women’s Voice group expressed concern over the bill, echoing some of Amazon’s own arguments:

    “The days of innovative services making it easier to live, work, and do business, especially during a pandemic, could be numbered if the American Innovation and Choice Online Act passes the full Senate,” said Patrice Onwuka, a senior policy analyst at Independent Women’s Voice, in a statement to WPN. “Today’s affirmative committee vote is very troubling because this bill is not about protecting competition in America, but expanding regulatory control over a handful of large tech corporations, even if to the detriment of consumers.”

    Lawmakers have been turning an increasingly critical eye toward Big Tech, making bills like the American Innovation and Choice Online Act an unsurprising development. As Amazon points out, however, if the bill is to succeed, it will need to apply to companies fairly and equitably. If the bill does unfairly target a single company, it could face substantial legal challenges.

  • Amazon Shareholders Shoot Down All Investor-Led Proposals

    Amazon Shareholders Shoot Down All Investor-Led Proposals

    Amazon’s leadership received a major vote of confidence with shareholders shooting down investor-led proposals.

    Investor activisim has been a growing issue for many companies, with investors leading the charge to force companies to change their habits, embrace causes, and more. According to Reuters, Amazon investors had 15 proposals, all of which were voted down.

    Among other things, investors wanted to address Amazon’s use of plastics, as well as challenge concealment clauses in its contracts. While shareholders did strike down the investors’ proposals, they did approve board members, executive compensation, and a stock split.

  • Amazon Is Losing Its Most Wanted Employees At An Alarming Rate

    Amazon Is Losing Its Most Wanted Employees At An Alarming Rate

    Amazon has an employee retention problem, losing the employees it wants to keep at double the rate of last year.

    According to a report by Business Insider, Amazon’s “regretted attrition” has doubled from last year. “Regretted attrition” is the term for losing employees a company wants to keep. Internal data seen by Insider says the company’s regretted attrition has risen to 12.1% since June 2021. In contrast, that same rate averaged 5% from 2016 till mid-2021.

    Amazon and other tech companies are fighting to keep their top talent in-house. The company recently increased its maximum base salary to $350,000, prompting Microsoft to increase its own salary budget and increase employee stock compensation.

    Amazon’s attrition appears to be company-wide. The Delivery Service Partner team saw a total attrition rate of 55%. Prime Air, the company’s drone delivery division, saw its attrition hit 30%, with at least one of its teams losing 71% of its employees. Even the company’s golden goose, AWS, has been hit hard, with some units losing as many as 35% of their personnel.

    According to Insider, compensation was the top reason for the regretted attrition, coming in at 26.8%, with career development issues coming in at 19.5%.

    It appears Amazon still has a long way to go if it wants to keep its talent and remain competitive.

  • Microsoft Turning to Pay Raises to Combat Employee Dissatisfaction

    Microsoft Turning to Pay Raises to Combat Employee Dissatisfaction

    On the heels of a report that employees are becoming less satisfied with their pay, Microsoft is looking to raise pay across the entire company.

    According to Business Insider, Microsoft conducted an internal poll earlier this year, in which just 66% of employees responded favorably about their compensation. This was down from 73% last year. In response, the company is looking to raise pay across the board.

    The move would also help Microsoft keep existing talent from moving to its competitors, especially Amazon. Amazon and Microsoft are the first and second-place cloud providers, and they have both scored talent-poaching victories over the other, and both are eager to head off such losses.

    The pressure is on Microsoft even more since Amazon increased its maximum base salary to $350,000 in February, and has been giving massive stock rewards to employees.

    Insider’s sources say the company could make an announcement as early as Monday.

  • Amazon Reverses Course on Employee Cell Phones After Deadly Tornado

    Amazon Reverses Course on Employee Cell Phones After Deadly Tornado

    Amazon has reversed course on one of its long-standing policies, allowing warehouse employees to keep their cell phones after a deadly tornado.

    Amazon had a long history of banning employees from having their cell phones when working in the company’s warehouses. That ban was suspended during the pandemic, but the company said it planned on reinstating it in January 2022. Deadly tornadoes in December, however, once again made the policy a focus of attention. Six workers were killed when a tornado struck the company’s Edwardsville, Illinois warehouse. Critics have said cell phones are an important tool for worker safety, giving them the ability to receive severe weather alerts, not to mention providing a way for family members to reach them in the event of an emergency.

    According to an internal memo seen by Motherboard, Amazon has finally relented and made the policy permanent, after initially saying it would keep it in place “until further notice” following the tornado.

    “We recognize the desire for employees to keep their mobile phones with them inside facilities, and the last two years have demonstrated that we can safely do so,” the notification read. “Therefore, we are making the temporary phone policy permanent worldwide, in all of our Operations facilities.”

    As Gizmodo points out, employees were already comparing Amazon’s policies to those of other companies with better safety records.

    “Amazon claims it’s a safety issue, but taking our phones means our families can’t reach us,” Amazonians United wrote in a petition. “Other companies like UPS do allow workers to keep their phones and even to have one headphone in as they work and they still have better safety records than Amazon. Taking our phones away isn’t about safety; it’s about controlling us. We demand that Amazon, like other companies, allow us to keep our phones on us.”

    Although Amazon has relented on this issue, it remains to be seen if the company will relent on other issues that are driving multiple unionization efforts on the part of its employees.

  • Amazon CEO Andy Jassy: ‘We’re Passionate About Improving Safety’

    Amazon CEO Andy Jassy: ‘We’re Passionate About Improving Safety’

    Andy Jassy has written his first letter to shareholders since becoming Amazon CEO, and he emphasized the company’s focus on worker safety.

    Amazon has been criticized for having a higher rate of workplace injuries in its warehouses than competitors, with its injury rate going up 20% in 2021. Despite the increase, Jassy says its injury rates are “misunderstood,” an the company is committed to improving safety even more.

    Our injury rates are sometimes misunderstood. We have operations jobs that fit both the “warehousing” and “courier and delivery” categories. In the last U.S. public numbers, our recordable incident rates were a little higher than the average of our warehousing peers (6.4 vs. 5.5), and a little lower than the average of our courier and delivery peers (7.6 vs. 9.1). This makes us about average relative to peers, but we don’t seek to be average.

    Jassy says that he focused on looking for a “silver bullet” to improve worker safety when he first became CEO, ultimately not finding it. He did, however, help implement a number of additional measures aimed at tackling the problem one step at a time.

    We have a variety of programs in flight (e.g. rotational programs that help employees avoid spending too much time doing the same repetitive motions, wearables that prompt employees when they’re moving in a dangerous way, improved shoes to provide better toe protection, training programs on body mechanics, wellness, and safety practices). But, we still have a ways to go, and we’ll approach it like we do other customer experiences—we’ll keep learning, inventing, and iterating until we have more transformational results. We won’t be satisfied until we do.

    Jassy has already developed a reputation as a hands-on CEO, personally intervening to help customers receive resolution to issues they’re having. His approach to improving worker safety appears to be another example of his leadership style.

  • Amazon Charging US Sellers 5% Fee For Inflation and Fuel

    Amazon Charging US Sellers 5% Fee For Inflation and Fuel

    Amazon is increasing its fees for US-based sellers, charging an additional 5% fee for inflation and fuel charges.

    Amazon is the world’s biggest e-commerce marketplace and is increasingly one of the largest shipping companies in the US. The company relies on third-party sellers for many of the products that populate its marketplace, but those sellers are about to get hit with additional fees, thanks to the increased cost of business Amazon is facing.

    According to CNBC, Amazon is notifying US sellers it will be charging them a 5% surcharge for inflation and fuel costs.

    “The surcharge will apply to all product types, such as non-apparel, apparel, dangerous goods, and Small and Light items,” the notice stated. “The surcharge will apply to all units shipped from fulfillment centers starting April 28.”

    The e-commerce giant says the costs are “subject to change.”

  • Amazon Intensifying Anti-Union Efforts After Workers Vote to Unionize

    Amazon Intensifying Anti-Union Efforts After Workers Vote to Unionize

    Amazon is intensifying its anti-union efforts in the wake of Staten Island employees voting to unionize.

    Amazon is notoriously anti-union, resorting to intimidation tactics and Pinkerton detectives to combat union efforts. The company has even been working on an internal app, one that would block pro-union words. In the wake of the Staten Island unionization vote, Amazon is ramping its efforts, according to Motherboard.

    “Amazon’s tactics have gotten very, very intense,” said Madeline Wesley, an Amazon warehouse worker, who was written up on April 10 for “soliciting” co-workers. “They’re getting away with lots of illegal anti-union activity.”

    Amazon has already been forced to walk back some of its previous actions, entering into an agreement with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to email some 1 million employees to inform them of their right to organize.

    According to Motherboard, experts believe Amazon is now in violation those agreements.

    “Amazon is violating the national settlement agreement,” said Seth Goldstein, an attorney who represents Amazon Labor Union workers. “These are blatant attacks on an agreement they were a party to. The core of the matter is Amazon agreed to something but they’re violating it because it suits their purposes for winning the election.”

    Given the company’s past actions, it’s a safe bet it may soon find itself in hot water again.

  • LinkedIn: Amazon Is the Top Place to Work

    LinkedIn: Amazon Is the Top Place to Work

    Amazon may draw scrutiny for its anti-union efforts on a regular basis, but that hasn’t stopped the company from earning LinkedIn’s top choice for workplace.

    LinkedIn analyzed 50 companies that are known for investing in their personnel, providing perks, and generally fostering a good place for people to build a career. Amazon came out on top, thanks to a variety of different factors, not the least of which is pay increases:

    The company recently announced that it’s doubling its maximum base salary for corporate and tech workers, and it raised average wages for warehouse workers late last year, increasing pay for more than half a million of its employees.

    In addition to base pay, Amazon is spending $1.2 billion over the next three years to provide additional education and skills training options for employees, and is also paying 100% of college tuition costs for frontline employees. The company will also pay for high school diploma and GED programs, as well as English proficiency certifications.

    With 1.6 million employees worldwide, and 1.1 million in the US alone, Amazon has established itself as one of the workforce leaders, in both size and benefits to the employee.

  • Amazon May Block Pro-Union Words in Upcoming App

    Amazon May Block Pro-Union Words in Upcoming App

    Amazon’s anti-union efforts continue to ramp up, with the company investigating the possibility of banning pro-union words in a planned internal app.

    Amazon has a long history of fighting against unionization, even going so far as to hire Pinkerton detectives to thwart organization efforts. The company has also been accused of violating labor laws in an effort to fight unionization at its Bessemer, Alabama warehouse. The company now appears to be taking its efforts even further, investigating the possibility of banning pro-union terminology in a planned app.

    According to The Intercept, the company is in the planning phases of developing a chat app for its workers. The company held a high-level meeting in August 2021 to discuss creating a social media app for workers in an effort to improve morale and sponsor employee happiness.

    As part of the planning, Amazon is looking at blocking a slew of words and phrases, including “union,” “grievance,” “pay raise,” “compensation,” “unfair,” “injustice,” “fairness,” “this is concerning,” and many more.

    “With free text, we risk people writing Shout-Outs that generate negative sentiments among the viewers and the receivers,” read a document seen by The Intercept. “We want to lean towards being restrictive on the content that can be posted to prevent a negative associate experience.”

    The company has said “many” of the words listed in the documents will not be screened out but, given Amazon’s history of fighting against unionization, it’s doubtful many believe that statement.

  • EU Prepares to Crack Down on Big Tech, Unveils Sweeping Measures

    EU Prepares to Crack Down on Big Tech, Unveils Sweeping Measures

    The European Union has unveiled sweeping measures to crack down on Big Tech and increase competition across the industry.

    The EU has unveiled the Digital Markets Act (DMA), aimed specifically at “gatekeeper” companies, according to The Verge. Gatekeepers are companies with a market cap of at least $82 billion, at least 45,000 active users, and that run a “platform.” Such criteria would cover Amazon, Apple, Google, Meta, and Microsoft, but could also cover smaller companies and services as well.

    Messaging, in particular, is a likely focus of the DMA, with the EU looking to force services like Facebook Messenger, iMessage, and WhatsApp to “open up and interoperate with smaller messaging platforms, if they so request.”

    The DMA would include a number of other provisions, including stopping gatekeepers from preferring their own apps and services, as well as giving users the ability to uninstall default apps that come on their devices, and even choose which apps they want to use during install and setup.

    Companies that sell or do business on a given platform would be entitled to access performance metrics from that platform. Similarly, companies that advertise on a platform would be given a way to independently confirm the performance of their advertising efforts.

    The penalties for failure to comply would be severe, including up to 10% of a company’s annual worldwide revenue and periodic penalties up to 5% of its daily earnings. Most notably, the EU would also have the authority to enforce “behavioral and structural remedies.” This could including mandating that a company change how it operates its platform or service, and could even include forcing a company to spin off portions of its business, if the anti-competitive concerns cannot otherwise be addressed.

    This is why, in the Digital Markets Act, there is a full toolbox where the sanctions become more and more severe,” the EU’s Commissioner for Competition, Margrethe Vestager told The Verge. “The fines will increase if you do not implement changes. Eventually, in the toolbox, there’s also the tool that you can actually break up a company if no change is happening, or if you are a repeat offender.”

    The DMA represents the single largest effort by the EU to reign in the power and influence of Big Tech, combining a number of different efforts into one comprehensive piece of legislation. The legislation has not passed yet but, given the momentum that’s been building in the EU, it’s almost certainly going to pass sooner rather than later.

  • Microsoft Hit With EU Antitrust Complaint Over Its Cloud Business

    Microsoft Hit With EU Antitrust Complaint Over Its Cloud Business

    Microsoft has been hit with an antitrust complaint regarding its cloud business in the EU, as rivals try to compete against the second-largest cloud provider.

    Microsoft Azure is second only to Amazon’s AWS in the cloud market. One significant advantage Microsoft has over all of its rivals, both large and small, is the ecosystem the company has built up for decades. The business world runs on Microsoft software, including Windows and Office, and that familiarity with the ecosystem gives the company a significant competitive advantage.

    According to Reuters, three of Microsoft’s EU competitors, including OVHcloud, have filed an antitrust complaint.

    “Through abusing its dominant position, Microsoft undermines fair competition and limits consumer choice in the cloud computing services market,” OVHcloud said.

    “We’re continuously evaluating how we can best support partners and make Microsoft software available to customers across all environments, including those of other cloud providers,” a spokesperson for Microsoft told Reuters in response.

    It’s always unusual when it’s the runner-up, and not the market leader, accused of antitrust violations. According to The Wall Street Journal, however, it does appear it’s Microsoft’s bundling of its productivity software that is at the heart of the issue. OVHcloud and its co-complainants allege that it costs Microsoft Office customers more if they choose to use a third-party cloud provider, rather than Microsoft’s offerings.

    The EU is generally tougher on companies than the US, more aggressively protecting consumer rights. If there is merit to the complaint, Microsoft could have a major issue on its hands.