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

To: Frost Byte who wrote (44318)	3/6/1999 11:00:00 PM
From: Sarmad Y. Hermiz	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 164684

Frost, >> 4) A report came out on Bloomberg this weekend stating that e-commerce is expected to be $900 billion in 2003, up from $40 billion this year. << Do you have the text or reference or link to this report ? A week ago, WSJ reported e-commerce is estimated at $6 to 13 Billion in 1998, with total retail commerce at $1.3 trillion. So that $900 billion sure looks very large. Thanks.

To: Frost Byte who wrote (44318)	3/7/1999 12:18:00 AM
From: larry oertel	Respond to of 164684

>AMZN's books business is profitable< I wonder if books are still "profitable" now that Amazon can't sell good reviews?

To: Frost Byte who wrote (44318)	3/7/1999 12:28:00 AM
From: larry oertel	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 164684

Bezoz interview out. This guy can B.S. with the best of em. Amazon.com founder spells out 'customer-centric' mission Try to define Amazon.com Inc. (Nasdaq:AMZN) to company founder and CEO Jeff Bezos and he's certain to disagree. It's unclear what exactly Amazon is just yet, so Bezos falls back on the mantra of creating an entirely new customer experience. Mentioning "selling products for profits" is tantamount to sullying the pure mission of innovation and building value. In an interview this week with PC Week Editor John Dodge, Bezos talked about these issues as well as profits, personalization and Amazon's future. PC Week: With its "Shop the Web" page and recent investment in drugstore.com, Amazon is expanding beyond books, videos and music. Will Amazon become a Web department store? Jeff Bezos Bezos: I disagree with that premise. We are trying to innovate in the e-commerce arena. That's our heritage. We are building something that can't be pigeon-holed. We defy easy analogy. It's not a vision that can be communicated in a sound bite. We want to be the most customer-centric company in the world. Come and discover and buy anything online. Barnes & Noble is on a different mission, and they are doing this because we are. PC Week: When will Amazon be profitable and how important are profits? Bezos: To be profitable [now] would be a bad decision. This is a critical formation time if you believe in investing in the future. We don't make external [profit] projections. We have internal ones and those change from time to time. PC Week: Profit sounds like a dirty word. Don't you have to be profitable eventually? Bezos: Profits are the lifeblood of a company but not the reason to exist. You don't live for your blood, but you couldn't live without it. We were profitable for about an hour in December, 1995, but it was probably a mistake. And in December of last year, our book business was profitable. But it's not clear that's in our shareholders' long-term interest. PC Week: How can you be experts in everything? Bezos: Take a company like Conde Nast. They have magazines that are the best in particular areas with the best editorial and merchandising staffs. Keep in mind that our strategy is to partner with others. We have over 200,000 associates. They put books into context. We have one [expert] who recommends books on Labrador Retrievers. We could never do that. [Our partners] give customers the best advice possible. PC Week: Will you be selling drugs and health aids on Amazon with the investment in drugstore.com? Bezos: We have a link to it ... but [no]. It is a separate company and another model for partnering in a very complex area. They have the same extreme focus on the customer experience that we have. PC Week: Your market cap is around $20 billion. How does that factor into your decision making? Bezos: It doesn't. Management needs to be focused 24 hours a day creating genuine value for customers. Wall Street analysts are focused on it. We are building an important and lasting company. PC Week: Does it reflect reality? Bezos: Long term, there is a 100 percent correlation between the [market cap] and value of the company. One thing I can say is that Amazon and other pure Internet plays are extremely volatile and are not appropriate for the portfolios of small investors. PC Week: Who are your competitors? Bezos: We have a whole bunch in different places. In music, it's Tower [Records]. In books, it's Barnes & Noble and Borders. Long term, there are no companies we focus on as competitors. PC Week: Were the stories about Amazon selling book review placements an embarrassment? Bezos: It was not embarrassing. This is something every catalog company and retailer does. The recommendations were never for sale. Now we disclose the whole practice. What surprised us is that our customers hold us to a higher standard. It's too bad there was this misunderstanding. PC Week: Small bookstores blame Amazon for their sorry state. What's your response? Bezos: They primarily point the finger at the big chains. I go to Elliot Bay Bookstore here in Seattle and buy half my books at bookstores. You can hear the bindings creak and you can touch and smell the books. There's been strong pressure on independent bookstores for five years. It started happening long before Amazon was around. PC Week: What's the next big thing with e-commerce? Bezos: The next big thing is personalization. We've only seen the first 2 percent. If Amazon has 6.2 million customers, there should be 6.2 million highly customized stores. It's a myth that there is an average customer. PC Week: What other e-commerce sites do you admire? Bezos: The Quicken Web [from Intuit] is really organized and extraordinary. I tend to use lots of small Web sites. I just found one on tree houses. That sort of thing. PC Week: What would you change about Amazon? Bezos: I do think it is the leader in e-commerce. The thing I would change is how long it takes the PC to turn on. The time it takes is completely unnecessary. PC Week: Will the PC forever own the Internet or will see all types of Internet appliances? Bezos: In the short term, it will be PCs and Macs. Long term there will be an incredible diversity of devices. A large portion of them will be wireless. But that's more than 10 years away. LOL! Read this again: "Profits are the lifeblood of a company but not the reason to exist. (profits)it's not clear that's in our shareholders' long-term interest. That's a new one. I guess Bezo really wants Amazon to be a Non-profit corporation.

To: Frost Byte who wrote (44318)	3/7/1999 10:22:00 AM
From: Glenn D. Rudolph	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 164684

Frost Byte, You clearly are not even close on any fact you stated and I am not just giving an opinion on that. You ought to be embarassed about your post when in fact you have not done proper research or do not understand what has been said in the 10Ks, 10Qs, management and the analysts. Let's start at the begeinning: 1) AMZN's books business is profitable No! Even by managment's own admission the book business is not profitable. Managment does claim that the books business was profitable for December 1998 only and that is disputable but lets say that in the month where people tend to buy the most, books were profitable for those four weeks. 2) AMZN, if they wanted to, could be profitable.....all they would need to do is reduce their SG&A expenses. Tead the 10Q. I posted a link here to a brakdown of the 10Q and even if Amazon had no SG&A expense, their operations would still be at a loss. 3) AMZN is not just a retailer of books, cds, videos....they are attempting to be THE WALMART of the web...THE retailer on the web......They have just added drugs/consumer products and that is just the beginning. AMZN does not sell drug store products. They do have a minority stake in a online drugstore firm call Drugstore.com. Secondly, you better focus on what Amazon is now anot what they are attempting to be. I am in retail jewelry and I am attempting to gain a monopoply in that industry by putting all of my competition out of business. It is not likely<G> Also, what is a "WALMART of the web?" Walmart does fine in their brick and mortar stores but they do not sell the majority of merchandise bought by consumers by a long shot. They happen, at this point in time, to have the largest gross sales and profits of any retailer but compared to the entire retail market, they are 2%. 4) A report came out on Bloomberg this weekend stating that e-commerce is expected to be $900 billion in 2003, up from $40 billion this year. This is true but $800 billion of that is business to business and $100 billion is retail. We do not know if the numbers will pan out but they still are not great for online retailers. 5) The management team at AMZN is brilliant, they are backed by John Doerr/Kleiner Perkins, and are working their butts off. The hard work and brilliance is subjective. Actually, I believe they are far from brilliant in that they have made some huge tactical errors over the last year. I do not see them at work daily so cannot comment on how hard they work. Working smart is more important anyway. 6) Look for Amazon insurance, financial services, travel, greeting cards, and anything that could possibly be sold on the Internet....look for these announcements this year. This is not now,is immaterial and pure speculation. Also, the chances of any of theses turning a profit are small. 9) AMZN is cash flow positive. Amazon is cash flow negative. Look it up! 10) 1999 for AMZN is like 1995/1996 for AOL...when AOL said screw Wall Street, we are building this business for the long-term...remember how much negative press they got for sending everyone disks for free access? AMZN is running their business for long-term shareholder value...... AOL has subsribers. The business are entirely different. 7) Merrill Lynch is about to initiate coverage on Amazon...Henry Blodget, the guy with the $400 Amazon price target, has just joined Merrill - keep in mind, Merrill has 13,000 brokers. Does this have any correlation to Amazons fundamentals? Does it mean anything? Please respond with answers to my statements and use documentation rather than hype. I have done my due diligence. You please do yours. Glenn