Introduction

Jeff Bezos founded Amazon.com, Inc, an American multinational technology corporation

headquartered in Seattle, Washington, in 1994. E-commerce, cloud computing, digital

streaming, and artificial intelligence are all areas where Amazon focuses. Along with Google,

Apple, Microsoft, and Facebook, it is one of the Big Five firms in the United States' information

technology industry (Lotz, 2018). The business has been known as "one of the world's most

powerful economic and cultural powers," as well as "the world's most successful brand"

(Kantar, 2019). Amazon has pioneered a number of notable innovations, including click

shopping, Amazon Prime, AWS, Kindle Direct Publishing, Kindle, Fire TV, Alexa, Amazon Studios,

and The Climate Pledge. Today, over a million individuals work at Amazon. In order for Amazon

to grow, it has developed and adapted to new processes that contribute to the company's

bottom-line growth and the development of its internal and external capabilities. Having said

that, strategic partnerships, coordination, and technology governance have had a crucial role in

Amazon’s success.
 I. Development of new processes

Working Backward

Over the years, Amazon has adopted many new processes to improve its operations and

efficiency. Adopting these processes can be risky; but they always aim to come up with

a solution that makes it simpler, quicker, safer, and cheaper than the competition (Chaffey,

2021). One of the most important processes integrated into the operations of Amazon is the

idea of "working backward". The latter is Amazon's product development strategy. Thus,

Amazon identifies that every new idea must begin with a client concern. The team then works

backward to find the optimal solution, utilizing previously collected data about client behavior.

This is in contrast to the more common approach of starting with a product or service concept

and then looking for clients who might be interested in purchasing it (Marr, 2020).

This procedure begins with the construction of a "press release" template by the product

manager. Marketers utilize press releases to get their ideas out to the public by announcing a

finished product or service, and they usually do so by highlighting what issues the concept

answers or what advantages it provides to the consumer. If the benefits described don't seem

appealing to buyers, they shouldn't be constructed. By bringing what is typically a last-mile

effort to the beginning of the product development cycle, the project gets off to a strong start

in the real world (McAllister, 2020).

The two-pizza teams rule

One other famous process used by Amazon is The two-pizza team rule. It consists of creating

teams that are “no larger than can be fed by two pizzas" (Bezos, 2021). Amazon’s two-pizza

team rule considers that collaboration is better when the team is smaller. Collaboration is

critical since software releases are moving quicker than ever before, and a team's ability to

produce software may be one of Amazon’s competitive advantages. Consider the following

scenario: A new product feature has to be introduced, and an Amazon team wants it to happen

as soon as possible so that they may reduce their go-to-market time. This is particularly critical

since they do not want the transformation to be a slow-moving process, but rather an agile

strategy in which waves of changes begin to have an impact.

Communication between teams is also crucial since the teams will eventually migrate to a

shared responsibility model. This instills a sense of responsibility in the team and encourages

them to view the project as a whole (AWS, 2021). DevOps is a set of strategies and technologies

that improves an organization's capacity to produce applications and services more quickly than

traditional software development procedures (Synopsys, 2021). Because you may be forming a

DevOps team or have one or more DevOps-focused employees on your team, cultural

transformation is also critical. Both of these techniques encourage team members to share

responsibilities.
Overall, the two-pizza teams initiative has helped to decrease the amount of moving parts

inside each team and the number of links that employees must maintain in order to do their

jobs (Marr, 2020).

Other process development initiatives.

Amazon also emphasized the development of an API-centric culture, in which teams were

urged to make their data available for use in projects elsewhere throughout the company. This

supported a shift away from data being housed in silos inside departments and difficult to

access from outside those departments owing to inconsistent storage, formatting, or security

standards (Marr, 2020). The latter is frequently seen as one of the keys to Amazon's success.

Amazon Web Services (AWS), Fulfillment by Amazon (FBA), and Amazon Alexa were all built on

top of such APIs.

The Amazon API concept allowed for the creation of innovative products goods and services in

a short amount of time. Amazon was able to transition to a scalable ecosystem and platform

business model thanks to APIs (2019, Biehl).

Amazon is always attempting to enhance its operations and efficiency by introducing new

procedures. These procedures are responsible for the company's bottom-line development and

the optimization of internal and external resources.

 II. Coordination

Amazon Kindle

Amazon has always maintained focus on its competition and has made sure that the release of

new products, services or processes is in line with that of competitors. Amazon introduced the

Kindle in 2007, almost three years before Apple introduced the iPad, which allowed it to expand

into the hardware industry, when Amazon principally began as an online retailer (Gupta, 2018).

The kindle sold out in approximately 5 and a half hours, which is a reflection of Amazon’s future

success in the field (Patel 2007).

Amazon Instant Video

The debut of iTunes in 2001 impacted customer behaviour substantially, as individuals began

downloading digital music instead of purchasing CDs in stores. Recognizing this trend, Amazon

debuted their video-on-demand service, Unbox, which was ultimately rebranded to Amazon

Instant Video, about a year before Netflix debuted video streaming. Amazon switched from

selling CDs and DVDs to delivering streaming services, requiring the company to build new skills

and pitting it against a new group of competitors, including Apple and Netflix (Gupta, 2018).
 III. Strategic partnerships

Third Party sellers

Bezos' ambition when he originally started Amazon's website in 1995 was to use the internet to

offer books at inexpensive costs. He built a virtual bookshop that has fewer fixed expenses and

a greater assortment than most physical bookshops. The notion immediately gained traction,

and Bezos recognised that customers shopping for other items may enjoy it as well. He began

adding music, DVDs, gadgets, toys, software, home products, and many other categories to

Amazon's online store.

Traditional shops such as Best Buy, Toys "R" Us, and Walmart faced a serious challenge from

Amazon's low pricing and huge assortment, as well as the ease of online shopping. Amazon

subsequently made its site available to third-party retailers, who could list their items for a

small charge on Amazon's site. Customers who want a greater selection of items from a variety

of vendors with the ease of purchasing them all at once can benefit from this arrangement.

With the addition of third-party sellers, Amazon evolved from an online shop to an online

platform, with competitors such as eBay, Craigslist, and others joining the fray (Gupta, 2018).
Amazoning a sector

As Amazon's stock price rose, it opened the door to partnerships and acquisitions with a variety

of firms in other industries such as Drugstore.com , Living.com, Pets.com, Wineshopper.com,

and Kozmo.com. In most cases, Amazon bought an ownership investment in these companies

so that it could profit from their success (Chaffey, 2021). Analysts frequently refer to a firm

'Amazoning a sector,' which means that one business dominates an online area, such as book

sale, making it impossible for competitors to gain market share.

Retailers

One example of the strategic patenerships conducted by Amazon is Waterstones. Waterstones

is one of the major conventional bookshops in the United Kingdom. It found internet

competition to be so costly and difficult that it finally formed a deal with Amazon, in which

Amazon markets and distributes its books online in exchange for a commission. Borders, a

significant book store in the United States, also uses the Amazon merchant platform to

distribute its products, a similar setup to that at toy store Toys R Us. Customers who buy books

in one category may be persuaded to buy apparel or technology in other categories as a result

of such collaborations. (Chaffey, 2021)

Partnership with Warner Bros

Amazon Studios was formed in 2011 in collaboration with Warner Bros. to generate original

motion picture content. It was suddenly up against Hollywood studios. Amazon, which began as

an online shop, took this route because video content aids in the conversion of viewers into

buyers on Amazon (Gupta, 2018). Jeff Bezos spoke at a technology conference in Los Angeles in

2016 and said “When we win a Golden Globe, it helps us sell more shoes.”
IV. Technology governance

Importance of technology at Amazon

Technology, according to Jeff Bezos, is critical to its continued success. In fact, Amazon employs

a wide range of techniques, including high-performance transaction systems, workflow and

queuing systems, data analytics, machine learning and pattern recognition, neural networks

and probabilistic decision making, among others. giving it a superior governance in technology

(Amazon, 2011). Data, artificial intelligence, and cloud computing are important facilitators of

everything Amazon does, from the goods and services it provides to the way the company

operates. Continuously enhancing these tools is critical not just for Amazon's competitiveness,

but also for its customers' satisfaction.

Some of Amazon's most recent AI uses, such as the Amazon Echo assistant and technologies in

the Amazon Go convenience store, are very prominent. Amazon Echo is a voice-activated

virtual assistant that can be used to stream music, get information, and, of course, order

products from Amazon in a more convenient manner (Gupta, 2018).

Amazon Go and books

The introduction of Amazon Go, a new type of store with no checkout needed, is the most

recent example of their business model process innovation.

There are no registers or cashiers, unlike most stores. It's what Amazon refers to as a "just walk 

out" shopping experience. The innovation aspect was in the fact that a customer would never

have to wait in line. For billing purposes, it uses the customer’s smartphone through an

application that is connected to his/her Amazon account. When items are taken or returned to

the shelf, this technology detects them and keeps track of them in a virtual cart (Tillman, 2021).

Amazon gains a competitive advantage by using innovative technology. Providing the

infrastructure to send the Kindle "Whispersync" update to ebook readers is a nice recent

example of this. Amazon.com stated in 2011 that Kindle books are now outselling hardcover

books. Amazon has sold 115 Kindle books for every 100 paperback books it has sold.
Conclusion

Most businesses describe themselves by their goods or by their competitors—for example, you

may consider yourself to be in the banking or car industries. However, defining Amazon in this

manner is difficult. Amazon has broadened its horizons to include its consumers.

Traditional product or industry boundaries no longer determine competition. Data and software

are becoming increasingly important in practically all enterprises as a result of rapid

technological advancements, blurring industry lines quicker than ever before. In the digital age,

competition frequently comes from the side, from new players, and broadening your

company's scope is critical to its long-term success.

As the example of Amazon demonstrates, this necessitates a careful balance of expanding your

business's breadth while keeping true to your key capabilities (Gupta, 2018). Therefore, it is fair

to say that Amazon's systematic creation of new methods, coordination, strategic relationships,

and technology governance enables bottom-line growth while also maximising internal and

external capabilities.
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