Amazon has made some self-aggrandizing acquisitions over the years . Whole Foods be around $ 14 billion . Game - streaming platform Twitch and on-line shoe store Zappos were n’t cheap either . For its next deed of ruthless corporate consolidation , the everything store go by the plenteous man on Earthreportedly design to drop over $ 1 billionon doorbell company Ring , probably the one element of software delivery Amazon has n’t found some elbow room to wring more money from yet .
Amazon support the be after acquisition to Reuters , but would not remark on the terminal figure of the deal , which were provided to the news federal agency by an unnamed source . The Bezos empire has been hunger after doorbells — or more specifically , threshold cameras and keyless entry — since at least 2016 , when it extend to purchase a smart lock company telephone August for $ 100 million . When August turned down the offer , Amazon released a camera and keyless whorl system promise Key to allow itscontractor couriersto clobber those Prime - shipped packagesinside your home .
Key has n’t exactlytaken off , with consumers truly untrusting about yield stranger memory access to their homes . So what ’s the sense in paying an parliamentary law of magnitude more for Ring than they bid August ? consumer likely are n’t the main play .
conversation with a number of Amazon messenger suggest one of the major inefficiencies in their packet delivery stem from businesses and large flat coordination compound . If Amazon can deal landlords and concern owners on install Key ( or Ring , or whatever they end up trademark it as ) , it ’s a win in the immediate , and another ( anti-)competitive edge over USPS , UPS , and FedEx , whose courier might not have keyless access .
It ’s the late ( and most dim ) part of a wide - reaching program for Amazon to control its owndelivery service , which includes warehouses it owns , warehouse it does n’t own , a internet of couriers and courier company partnership , and now … doorbells . Doorbells , which , as GeekWire pointed out , already interface with Amazon ’s Alexa platform .
All from a company that efficaciously paidzero dollar sign in Union income taxeslast year .
[ ReutersviaGeekwire ]
AmazonJeff Bezos
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