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Technology Stocks : Amazon.com, Inc. (AMZN) -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Randy Ellingson who wrote (24870)	11/7/1998 1:14:00 PM
From: Rob S.	Respond to of 164684

Thanks Randy. The point that I think many are missing is how fierce the competition will become. In this post PC revolution society a lot of money is being pumped into a new industry on the chance that it will create the kind of protectable markets and wealth associated with Microsoft. Recently it has been pointed out that Amazon is valued at several times the multiple of Microsoft based on future sales and earnings potential. It is important to remember that this is only POTENTIAL earnings and is not real to anyone but true believers that Bezos' best plans can be carried out without too many hitches. The dynamics Amazon.com's stock has more to do with the fact that huge sums of money were amassed because of the PC "revolution" and rise of other baby-boom generation expansion and now is there to be thrown at Amazon and other darlings. All you can say about Amazon is that they have had early success in growing sales and market reach but that they have done so in commodity markets which are relatively easy for competitors to counter. Can that early success translate somehow into protectable markets and large enough profits to justify $6 billion or higher valuation? Lotus thought so. Wordperfect thought so. While companies such as AOL and Microsoft have businesses from which it is somewhat difficult, costly or incovenient for customers to move away from, Amazon has no such position, probably much less so relative to the strength of Lotus or Wordperfect. What defacto standard does Amazon enjoy? IBM Commerce Research Institute (a participatory non-profit group), Arthur Anderson and other respected organizations have concluded after extensive modeling and market studies that the Internet will be a great enabler of competitive shopping. It is asserted that the very nature of the Internet allows people to more easily find products and compare prices. And it is reasoned that the early emergence of "Shop Bots" and supplier/product databases will mushroom into greatly enhanced tools to facilitate more vendor and price comparison. The conclusion to these and other studies is that the Internet will lead to a consolidation of commodity product supply channels and a contraction of the functions needed to support them - only the most efficient will survive and the survivors will have narrow margins. Where is the payoff for Amazon investors except the hope for increased speculation? Competition is JUST STARTING to become involved in entering the market with meaningful efforts that are integrated with more complete supply channel strategies. The posibilities for increased competition is almost endless.

To: Randy Ellingson who wrote (24870)	11/7/1998 4:50:00 PM
From: Glenn D. Rudolph	Respond to of 164684

Form 144 for AMAZON.COM INC COM filed on Nov 6 1998 Issuers Name AMAZON.COM INC COM Ticker Symbol AMZN Seller JEFFREY P. BEZOS Address 1516 2ND AVE Address SEATTLE WA 98101 Phone 206 622-2335 Filing Date Nov 6 1998 Shares to be Sold 180,000.00 Value 22,770,000.00 Broker SSBI This data extracted from Form 144's, filed in paper with the SEC, is provided electronically to CYBERNET DATA SYSTEMS,INC. by the Vickers Stock Research Corp. CYBERNET DATA SYSTEMS makes no claims concerning the validity of the information contained on this page and will not be held liable for any use of this information.