Читать книгу Supply Chain Management Best Practices - David Blanchard - Страница 26

How does a company that launched as recently as the mid-1990s on a simple model of selling books via a website rather than through traditional brick-and-mortar retail stores wind up as the most valuable brand in the world, dominating not just in online retailing of virtually every product imaginable, but also in online streaming (movies, music, TV), electronic devices (e-readers, smart speakers), groceries (both online and brick-and-mortar), cloud services, book publishing, and even logistics? How is it possible for a company in a niche that barely existed just a generation ago to grow so much in stature that it's now responsible for half of the $500 billion e-commerce market in the United States? How does an unknown company go from ground zero to displacing the biggest 800-pound-gorilla—Walmart—as the most valuable retailer in the world (at least as far as market cap)?²⁷

Of course we're talking about Amazon, and the answer is simple: technology, specifically supply chain technology. Amazon's meteoric rise to the top came by following the same basic playbook Walmart followed in its own ascendancy: leveraging logistics and supply chain technology to reshape the entire retail landscape in their own image. Amazon's first big foray into technology came in 2012 when it paid $775 million (which was considered a risky investment at the time but seems like quite the bargain now) to acquire Kiva Systems, a manufacturer of warehouse robots. By 2020, Amazon had more than 200,000 robots deployed throughout its warehouses and fulfillment centers. Also by 2020, the company had been approved by the Federal Aviation Administration to operate its Prime Air fleet of delivery drones, signaling the beginning of Amazon's trial runs of customer deliveries via drone.

Just as Walmart reinvented retail best practices when it started opening stores in small towns and locating regional distribution centers close to its stores, Amazon is taking that basic concept and adding its own spin to it: Rather than opening stores in cities and towns both big and small, Amazon just keeps building more warehouses. Flush with the unprecedented demand for its services in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, the online retail giant announced plans to open 1,000 warehouses that would be closer to neighborhoods (rather than locating them on the outskirts of towns, where most distribution facilities tend to be found).

“Amazon is winning mind-share and wallet-share by making shopping convenient, easy, and frictionless for customers,” says Russ Meller, vice president, solution design and research and development with consulting firm Fortna. “They are shifting customer expectations around convenience, speed, price, and selection. They're moving e-commerce away from the store, computer, and the phone, and integrating it seamlessly in our lives. All you have to do is ‘just ask’ Alexa,” Amazon's voice-activated device that makes ordering a product from the retailer as simple as just saying it out loud. Powering Alexa, Meller explains, is “an artificial intelligence engine and platform for commerce that could eliminate brand from the equation and stack the deck in favor of Amazon's private label offerings.”²⁸