Apropos Ritu Bhandari’s Thinkly about her Indigo experience, and my comment about the predatory behaviour of companies that have eventually left people with fewer choices, I missed out mentioning Amazon. While we have watched in awe as this company hit a market capitalisation of $1 trillion within 23 years of its launch, the fact is that this company has done it at the expense of hundreds and thousands of competitors, both online and offline. With the phrase often attributed to Bezos, “Other people’s margin is our opportunity”, Amazon’s predatory pricing has sucked out profitability in every segment that it has turned its gaze to; from Zappos to Barnes & Nobles to even small businesses, Amazon is becoming the gorilla everyone should be wary of. 

Amazon controls $1 of every $2 spent online in the US today; decides which products and services show up in a customer’s search (more and more consumers are bypassing Internet search and directly searching within Amazon) and thereby has an asymmetric influence in deciding the best sellers and the winners. And now, with their white labels, it bypasses brands completely, Amazon is a great example of the inability of a regulator to rein in a company. A failed antitrust policy. 

Economically speaking, Amazon’s success has been at the expense of employment; it has destroyed far more jobs than it has created. And killed competition - the cornerstone of any antitrust policy. Time for 7 mini-zons, perhaps?

So, is the new evil Facebook (fake news), Google (privacy?) or Amazon (choices, or lack of?). Thinkly, anyone?