Apparently, the rumors are true. Later this week, Amazon is expected to announce it’s own smartphone brand.
Billions have been invested. Warehouses have been built. Tablets and other devices are being constructed. Creating, licensing and copyright deals are being done. Stock investors are cheering. Competitors are quaking. Customers…we’ll see how they respond. I’ll talk about that later. One of their hopes is that Amazon lovers will use their upcoming smartphones to buy more stuff off the Amazon website. Amazon is already branching into to areas like grocery store delivery. But smartphones aren’t groceries.
Other well respected and popular mega conglomerates have tried to excel in the smartphone world. Google had Nexus One. Little more than one persons were buying it. They moved on to Motorola, then scratched the idea. Blackberry is lucky to even be alive. And that was once one of the most popular brands in the market. The Facebook phone flopped. And even Windows Phone is holding on to only three percent of the smartphone market. Come to think of it, the only two companies running away with the smartphone game are Apple and Samsung. But Amazon, and some tech analysts, insists this is Amazon’s next logical step. I’m pessimistic. The odds aren’t in their favor. And Amazon is going to have to get very, very, very creative to offer things the smartphone kings don’t. What do you think Amazon’s chances are?